After the End
by AiraTerrindor
Summary: In which the Hero of Ferelden prioritizes dealing with the all-out war sweeping the continent over seeking a cure for the taint and ends up stuck leading a religious movement with a strange mark on her hand.
1. Chapter 1

Very Important Disclaimer: This is a fanfiction. I do not own Dragon Age.

A sequel to both Sunshine and Hawke's Guide to Accidentally Starting a War

In Which Nobody Knows What is Happening

Olivia woke up lying in a small bed with a lumpy mattress, staring at a low wooden ceiling. She felt groggy and had a headache the size of a small continent, along with a left hand that was pulsing regularly with a sharp, stabbing pain. Otherwise, though, she actually felt pretty good. She tried to focus on remembering exactly what had been happening before she had been apparently knocked out, but all she got was the vague impression of… being chased by giant spiders? Wasn't she supposed to be at a peace conference? All right, maybe the spiders had been a bizarre concussion-induced dream. She did feel like she'd been hit over the head. Though with her luck, it was probably both.

As she tried sluggishly to push herself into a seated position, another lance of pain went down her arm from her left hand, which… had a glowing green mark on the palm. That couldn't be good. Kind of a pretty green, though… Olivia changed her assessment of her physical state from 'probably concussed' to 'definitely concussed'. The glowing green mark sparked, accompanied with another sharp burst of pain. Lovely.

Olivia was still staring rather stupidly at her hand when the door to the room swung open, revealing a stressed-looking woman with short black hair and… "Leliana? What happened?"

The bard sighed. "There was some kind of explosion." Leliana began ticking what she was saying off on her fingers. "Except for you, everyone who was at the Conclave was killed. There is now a giant hole into the Fade in the sky at the epicenter of the blast that is slowly getting bigger. The Rift-that's what we've been calling it- matches the mark on your hand and every time it gets larger, the mark spreads. Also the Rift is periodically spewing demons and the mark is killing you. I think that covers everything."

Olivia stared at her. "Is there any good news? At all? Or is it all terrible?"

"Well, the elven apostate who stopped the mark from killing you while you were unconscious says that the mark can probably be used to close the Rift."

"That is good. Show me this Rift thing?"

"All right," said Leliana, leading Olivia out.

Outside, everyone stared at Olivia, whispering and giving hopeful looks.

"They found out that the Hero of Ferelden was here," explained Leliana, noticing Olivia looking at them.

Olivia nodded. "So," she asked, waving vaguely at the dark haired woman accompanying Leliana, "who's your friend?"

"Cassandra Pentaghast, part of the inquisition."

Up ahead, Olivia could see flashes of light and hear the sounds of combat. She rushed forward, finding that the source of the commotion came from a group of demons being fought by a mysterious bald elf and a very familiar dwarf with spectacular chest hair. The elf looked familiar as well, but wasn't someone she remembered ever meeting before, more like someone she had seen in a dream or known as a small child. Seeing him brought forward the vague, confused old memories she had been given by the elven Arcane Warrior trapped in the gem in the Brecillian Forest, all the way back during the Blight. Maybe the ancient mage had known someone who looked like him?

Deciding that it didn't matter, Olivia dismissed the thoughts of where she could have seen the elf, or at least a lookalike of him, from her mind and leapt forward just as the last of the demons fell with a crossbow bolt sticking out of it.

Olivia grinned at the archer, suddenly feeling immensely more cheerful. "Varric! I haven't seen you in ages!"

"It's been eight months," he pointed out.

"When I'm slowly dying from the darkspawn taint? That's practically forever."

"What?" For some reason, the elven man standing next to Varric looked immeasurably confused. "That can't be right."

"I'm pretty sure it is," said Olivia irritably.

"No it really can't. I'm the one who healed you when you fell out of the Rift. There was a lot of strange Rift energy, but definitely no taint. You were wearing Grey Warden armor, so I specifically checked in case it affected the mark."

Everyone who had any idea what they had been talking about stared at him blankly. Olivia thought about announcing that he was obviously wrong, then, but… She had been feeling good since she woke up. She was seriously out of her depth here. Maybe this was all a bizarre concussion-induced dream.

"Maybe all the energy running through you from the mark burned it out?" the elf muttered, seemingly talking more to himself than anyone else. "I really should think through the possible side effects of these things more."

"Okay," said Cassandra, suddenly reminding everyone that she was there. "We still need to fight our way through the demons between us and the breach. Any discussion of the mark's miraculous ability to heal the bearer of the darkspawn taint can be discussed later." The elf looked disappointed. "Later, Solas," Cassandra said firmly.

"Heal…?" Olivia stared at her hand.

"Even I have no idea how that happened," said Solas.

"Why should you?"

"Because, er, I was studying the mark while you were unconscious?" He gave a nervous chuckle.

Cassandra rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Snap out of it, Warden!"

Olivia shook herself. She could not deal with this right now. Rift first. "Do we have enough soldiers to distract the demons with a frontal assault while we sneak around the back and close the Rift quickly before more can come through?"

Leliana nodded. "That would work. Cassandra knows the way."

"Good." Olivia nodded to Cassandra. "Let's go."

"Why is this what my life is like now?" mourned Cassandra.

"Cheer up," said Varric. "You could be one of the rest of us."

Halfway up the path, the four of them ran into a small demon-spewing rift that looked like a miniaturized version of the big one. "Hurry!" yelled Solas, grabbing Olivia's glowing hand and holding it up facing the miniature rift. Olivia was about to growl at him and yank her hand away when a beam of green light arched between the mark on the hand and the small rift.

"So…that's how to close the Rift?" Olivia asked. "Also, mini-Rift?"

"They've been appearing more and more frequently farther and farther away from the large one," explained Cassandra. "Once it's closed they should stop. Probably."

"You're really filling me with confidence here," said Olivia.

As they reached the blast zone, Leliana met up with them, followed by several soldiers. "There you are. Thank the Maker."

"Was there ever any doubt that we'd arrive?" Olivia asked rhetorically.

"Cocky," said Leliana. Olivia smiled at her.

They headed down toward the crater. "Is that red lyrium?" muttered Varric, looking around.

"The stuff that drove your Knight-Commander crazy?" asked Olivia. "Never seen any, but it's lyrium and it's red, so I'd say yes."

As they climbed down into the center of the blast zone, beneath the gigantic Rift, an eerie voice began echoing around the crater. Now is the hour of our victory. "Well, that's not disturbing at all," said Olivia.

"That voice sounds vaguely familiar," commented Varric. "Though it could just be the creepy echoing quality. I've certainly heard plenty of voices like that."

"Same here," said Olivia.

Bring forth the sacrifice, whispered the voice.

Someone help me, cried second, female, voice.

What's going on here? The first two ghostly voices were joined by a third, this one rather obviously belonging to Olivia. Cassandra stared at her. "That was you! Most Holy called out to you." She seemed to finally be figuring out that Olivia wasn't the one responsible for the explosion. "But…" Cassandra was interrupted by a sparking of the Rift, followed by the appearance of the ghostly image of the Divine, held in the air by glowing energy, with a looming, indistinct shadow standing over her. A ghostly version of Olivia ran up. What's going on here? The ghostly Olivia repeated.

The ghostly version of the Divine turned to look at the ghostly Olivia. Run while you can! Warn them!

We have an intruder. The first, eerie voice came from the shadow standing over the Divine. Kill her!

The three ghostly images vanished, the disembodied conversation beginning again from the beginning. "You really were there!" exclaimed Cassandra. "Who was that attacking? What happened to the Divine? Did all that really happen? What are we even seeing?"

Olivia shook her head. "I don't remember any of this."

"We're seeing echoes of what happened here," explained Solas. "The fade bleeds into this place." He was staring up at the Rift. "The Rift isn't sealed, but it is closed. With the mark we can open it up and close it the rest of the way, but opening it is going to attract demons on the other side."

Olivia sighed. "Everyone be ready then." The soldiers drew their weapons and she held the marked hand up to the Rift.

As before, with the miniature rift, a beam of light arched between the mark and the Rift, this time forcing the Rift open. Before she could close it, a gigantic pride demon at least fifteen feet tall spilled out of the Rift.

"Just what we needed." With her free hand, Olivia flung a wall of ice at the demon, checking to make sure that the others were keeping it busy before turning her attention back to the rift. "It's not closing!"

After a few minutes, the pride demon was dead, but the Rift was still open and Olivia was beginning to not feel too well. Suddenly, she felt something…twist…in the Rift, and it closed back up, though this felt more…stable…than before. "I think…that did something," gasped Olivia right before collapsing.

Olivia woke up in the same room as earlier. Her hand wasn't hurting anymore. "Well, that's an improvement," she commented to the ceiling. She checked her left hand. The glowing green mark was still there. Olivia wondered vaguely if it was ever actually going to go away. Then it occurred to her that she had no idea what it would do to her if the mark did go away. For all she knew that would kill her.

She let her arm fall back onto the bed and stared up at the ceiling for a few minutes. It was a nice ceiling. She could really get behind looking at that ceiling…pretending that her life hadn't just taken another turn for the bizarre…

The door swung open and Olivia automatically startled upright, jumping out of bed. The woman who had entered, a nervous-looking elf squeaked and jumped, dropping the crate she had been carrying. She looked flustered. "I didn't know you were awake, I swear!"

"Because coming in while I'm asleep is much less creepy," said Olivia sarcastically. The elf looked dismayed. "Relax, sarcasm is how I cope. I'm sure you aren't really a creepy stalker."

The elf looked even more horrified. She fell to her knees and bowed. "I beg your forgiveness and your blessing. I am but a humble servant."

Now that, on the other hand? That was slightly creepy. Yikes. Exactly what had happened while she'd been unconscious this time? People hadn't acted this weird even after she'd killed the Archdemon. "All right, you're, you're fine. Um, please stand up," said Olivia awkwardly. To her immense relief, the elf did. "So…what happened?" asked Olivia.

"They say you saved us. The Breach stopped growing, just like the mark on your hand. You're back in Haven. It's all anyone has talked about for the last three days." Well, that was good. The part about the Breach and her hand, at least. Not so much the 'unconscious for three days part'. Now if only she knew why this woman was acting so…awestruck seemed like a good description. What exactly had they been saying for the past three days? "Lady Cassandra wants to talk to you in the Chantry," added the elf, beginning to back slowly away and looking terrified. "She said 'at once'."

"Okay, got it," said Olivia. The elf seemed to take that as a dismissal and bolted out the door. Olivia followed at a more leisurely pace.

Outside on the way to the Chantry, everyone Olivia passed stared and whispered to each other as she went by. This time it was less 'hopeful' and more 'awed and terrified'. The whole thing was really putting her on edge.

She found Cassandra and Leliana in the operations room that had been set up in the Chantry, arguing with an angry-looking man. When she entered, the man glared and pointed accusingly at her. "Chain her! I want her prepared for travel to the capitol for trial!"

"Not happening," said Cassandra.

Roderik glared at her. "You walk a dangerous line, Seeker."

Cassandra rolled her eyes. "I walk a line that does not end in riots."

"Stop acting irrational, Chancellor Roderik," added Leliana. "The idea that Olivia would endanger everything that she fought to protect as a Warden is ludicrous."

"And that's another thing!" shouted the man, apparently named Chancellor Roderik. "Where are the rest of the Grey Wardens while all this is going on? Maybe they're responsible!"

This time Leliana rolled her eyes. "Your conspiracy theories are getting more and more far-fetched, Chancellor."

"Besides," said Cassandra, "the Breach may have stopped growing, but it's still there. We need her."

"So, I'm guessing he thinks I was behind the explosion," commented Olivia, pointing at the Chancellor.

"She's not a suspect," said Cassandra, sounding annoyed.

"You, on the other hand…," added Leliana, looking at the man pointedly.

"Now I'm a suspect?" asked the Chancellor angrily.

"You and a lot of other people."

"But not the person who was found unconscious at the center of the destruction?"

"Definitely not," said Leliana.

"I heard the voices at the temple," added Cassandra. "The Divine called to her for help."

"So that mark and the fact that she survived are a complete coincidence?"

"Providence. The Maker sent her to us in our darkest hour."

Olivia raised her eyebrows. "Seriously?" she said incredulously.

"You were exactly what we needed when we needed it, now and during the Blight," said Cassandra. "Try telling me that's a coincidence." Olivia wasn't exactly sure how to respond to the depth of the other woman's conviction. For the first time in at least a decade, she was feeling out of her depth. She didn't like it.

"Er…" Olivia began awkwardly, not sure how to continue.

Leliana looked at her sympathetically. "You should probably get used to that," she commented. "You'll probably get a lot of that now. After what happened at the Breach earlier got out, people have begun thinking of you as a divine savior. They've already started calling you the Herald of Andraste."

"I… honestly don't know how to react to that," said Olivia.

"Maybe we should focus on the Breach," said Leliana helpfully. "That mark is still the only way we have to close it."

"This isn't your decision!" complained the Chancellor.

Cassandra melodramatically slammed a gigantic book down on the table. "You know what this is? It's a writ from the Divine giving us the authority to act. As of this moment I declare the Inquisition reborn." She walked up to the Chancellor and poked him in the chest. "We will close the Breach, we will find those responsible and we will restore order, with or without your approval!"

"Wow," said Olivia quietly. That was impressively dramatic. Chancellor Roderik glared at Cassandra and left sulkily.

"That's the plan," said Leliana. "Rebuild the Inquisition of old. Find people who will stand against the chaos. We have no leader, no followers, and no support from the Chantry."

Oddly, Leliana's summation of the situation made Olivia feel steadier, more on familiar ground. Despite everything stacked against them, it was bizarrely comforting. "Well," she said, beginning to smile. There was a gigantic hole in reality outside, she appeared to have been miraculously cured of the darkspawn taint and probably wasn't even a Grey Warden anymore, and she had no idea what was going on, but the impossibility of the situation and ridiculously long odds of succeeding in saving the world, at least, was familiar. "We've started before with less. Shall we?"

Just as the three women turned to the war table, a knock came at the door. "We saw Chancellor Roderik leave," called out an accented female voice. "I hope everyone is still alive in there."

"Yes, come in, Josephine," called Leliana.

A well-dressed woman entered, followed by… "Oh, hey, Cullen." Honestly, she wasn't particularly surprised to see him. He seemed to turn up everywhere. "So!" she said, half manically. "Let's get to work!"

Later that night found Olivia sitting on the roof of the small hut where she had been staying, generally avoiding other people. The entire town of Haven really did seem certain that Olivia was some kind of 'chosen one'. It was unsettling. She stared up at the eerie green glow of the Breach off in the distance. Up until a week ago, the Temple of Sacred Ashes had sat beneath that patch of tattered sky. Olivia's hand automatically moved to finger the pendant filled with darkspawn blood hanging at her throat.

"Thinking?" Olivia turned her head to see Leliana settling down beside her.

"Yes." Olivia lay back on the roof, still gazing at the Breach. "I don't really know what to think of all of this. Giant holes in the sky? Herald of Andraste? I mean, my life just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Every time I think that it's finally settled down into something predictable, something happens to throw it all into chaos again, and those somethings keep getting progressively stranger. Getting caught by the Templars and sent to the Circle Tower? That isn't too far-fetched. Being recruited by the Grey Wardens? Less likely but not too much so. Ending a Blight despite starting out with a group of allies made up of two people that can's stand one another and a dog? Very, very unlikely. Surviving killing an Archdemon? Thought to be impossible and couldn't have happened except for a very bizarre set of coincidences. Remember, that vision you had, back during the Blight? The one that none of us ever really figured out whether it was really coming from the Maker or just something we wanted to believe was from the Maker because of how awful things were? It's like that. Is it that everyone's right about the Herald of Andraste thing, of is it just that I want them to be right because I want an identity to latch on to because I've suddenly lost my powers and can no longer think of myself as a Grey Warden. And because I want to believe that the Maker cares about what happens to people," she added quietly. "Because I want to believe that there is some justice in the world. Sorry," she added in a more normal voice. "I'm monologuing. That's a bad habit to fall into."

Leliana laughed. "I think you're excused just this once." She lapsed into silence and the two of them stared up at the sky. The Breach and the stars. After a while, Leliana spoke again. "But for the record? I believe it's real."

"And I hope you're right."


	2. Chapter 2

In Which the Plot Thickens- And There is a Paradox

Everyone was insanely busy for the next couple weeks. Messages were sent out, people ran around doing recruiting and administrative work… most of which was almost irritatingly- or perhaps comfortingly, Olivia's opinion on the matter tended to change based on her mood- similar to what Olivia had been doing during the Blight, just with fewer darkspawn.

Perhaps most importantly, however, Solas, the elven apostate who had kept the mark from killing Olivia and become the local rift expert, figured out how to close the rift. "We need a lot of magical power to boost what you do with the mark," he announced to Olivia. "We could get it from either a large number of mages or Templars."

"We should talk to the Templars," said Cullen immediately.

"I think the mages would be better," said Solas.

They glared at one another. The two of them seldom agreed on anything. Olivia sighed. "Alright. You two…"

Josephine cut in. "You should probably talk to the Chantry, too. We might be able to get some of them on our side and then the ones that are against us will lose strength."

Cullen stared at her. "Are you joking? They want to kill her. We should go get the Templars."

Personally, Olivia felt rather like that wasn't a much safer option, but still… "Josephine has a point. We could at least try talking to them." They should at least try diplomacy.

As it turned out, going to Val Royeau to talk to the Chantry did, in fact, go just as horribly as Cullen suspected it would, but not for the reasons he was thinking. They did meet a couple people who offered their help- Vivienne, literally the only High Enchanter who had stuck with the Chantry and Sera, a rather quirky-seeming elf who offered the help of the Friends of Red Jenny, a large organization of people who, well, Charade had tried to explain it once but Olivia still wasn't exactly sure what they did- it sounded a lot like some of what she had been doing right before the whole world went pear-shaped. Sort of. Just with less focus on trying to find a cure for the Taint.

No, the reason the trip went wrong was not because of the Chantry but because of the Templars. Their Lord Seeker Lucius, leading a large group of Templars, showed up in the middle of the discussion, knocked out the woman Olivia had been talking to, made a rambling speech about destiny and such, and announced that they were all leaving the city and would no longer protect it.

Actually, this was also kind of reminiscent of the things Olivia had been doing during the Blight. She'd certainly interacted with a lot of crazy people who made rambling speeches about destiny and such back then.

"Has the Lord Seeker Lucius gone mad?" asked Cassandra, sounding shocked.

"I'm going to have to go with 'yes'," said Olivia. "Trust me. I've met a lot of crazy people, and he is definitely crazy."

"But he was always so sensible!"

"Not anymore, apparently. I guess this rules out getting help from the Templars."

"Don't write them off yet," said Cassandra. "There have to be some of them who see that he's crazy."

Olivia just stared at her. The likelihood of that happening was extremely low. "We should go back to Haven."

"Excuse me." An elven woman appeared from behind a pillar.

Cassandra looked surprised. "Grand Enchanter Fiona?"

Solas seemed surprised as well. "Isn't it a bit dangerous for the leader of the Rebellion to be here?"

"I heard about this gathering and had to come," said the Grand Enchanter. "I wanted to see the Herald of Andraste in person. If you need help with the Breach, my people are a better option."

"Why didn't you die at the Conclave?" asked Cassandra suspiciously.

"I thought it might be a trap and sent a proxy instead. You'll notice that Lord Seeker Lucius wasn't there either. It disgusts me that the Templars got away with this."

Of course she thought that the Templars were responsible. "Let's try not to assume anything about anyone without evidence," said Olivia tiredly.

Fiona looked skeptical. "I'd like to invite you to Redcliffe to meet with us. An alliance could be beneficial to both of us, after all. I hope to see you there." The Grand Enchanter turned and left.

"Let's go back to Haven," said Cassandra.

Back at Haven, they already knew everything that happened. "My scouts sent word ahead," explained Leliana.

"It's a pity that the Tempars have abandoned their senses as well as the capitol," said Cullen.

Olivia refrained from pointing out that she'd never had much faith in the Templars' senses in the first place. "At least we know who to talk to now," she said.

"The mage rebellion could be ten times crazier than Lord Seeker Lucius," said Cullen, sounding annoyed. "The Templars can't all agree with him."

"But the mages did at least invite us," pointed out Olivia. "That suggests that they actually have an interest in talking."

"If the mages are responsible for the Conclave this could be a trap," pointed out Cassandra.

"It might not be. And know for sure that the Templars don't like us." Cullen didn't seem very happy about that. Olivia sighed. This was getting pretty tiresome. "Cullen, can I talk to you in private for a minute?"

Now he looked confused. "All right." Olivia took his arm and pulled him off to the side.

"Cullen. I understand that you want the Templars to join us. You still care about the Order and your friends in it. I also admit that there are probably a lot of good people in the Templars. People who just want to protect others. But not only would they probably attack us on sight, I just cannot trust them. Because even ignoring all the corruption in the Order, the Order's methods are inherently wrong and the Templars who have stayed are not going to understand that." Cullen looked about to protest, but Olivia held up a finger. "Hear me out. Imprisoning people whose only crime is existing is wrong. Taking children from their families is wrong. Killing anyone who tries to resist that is wrong. The rite of tranquility…is so wrong that anything I can say about it isn't even adequate. Do you even realize how much they've done to you?" It felt really good to get all that out. Ranting was more cathartic than she would have thought.

"The Tempars haven't…"

"Gotten you addicted to a debilitating substance? Ordered you to kill someone they knew you were in love with if she became possessed during her Harrowing as some kind of twisted test of loyalty?"

Cullen was looking a bit pale. "I…I need to go think." He turned around and bolted.

Olivia walked back over to Leliana, Cassandra, and Josephine. "What did you say to him?" asked Leliana.

"The truth." Leliana winced.

"So, we're going after the mages?" asked Josephine.

"That's probably a trap!" said Cassandra.

This set off another round of bickering, Josephine and Cassandra walking off still arguing.

Leliana sighed. "There is another thing. As you already know, several months ago, all of the Grey Wardens in Orlais and most of the ones in Ferelden disappeared. I wouldn't suggest getting involved, but the timing is a bit…interesting. Honestly, I'm worried that maybe Chancellor Roderik might have a point. The only Wardens they left behind seem to be Alistair and yourself, both of whom haven't actually been active Grey Wardens in a long time."

That sounded really bad. "You're suggesting that they were responsible for what happened at the Conclave?" Asked Olivia. She really didn't want that to be true, but… it did sound incredibly suspicious.

"Maybe, maybe not. My agents have heard about a Warden named Blackwall in the Hinterlands. It would make me feel better if you talked to him. Unless he confirms that there really is something going on with the Wardens. In which case it wouldn't make me feel better, but at least we'd know."

Olivia sighed. "I really hope your suspicions are unfounded."

"Again, so do I."

As it turned out, Blackwall knew absolutely nothing. The expedition wasn't completely useless, though, as they did manage to get a few new allies and close several more of the mini-rifts. They also found some journals on the Storm Coast that had belonged to Grey Wardens, but the information in them was singularly unhelpful. All they could gather was that the Wardens were looking for someone. Based on how the long the journals seemed to have been there and the lack of specificity, it could even have been Olivia herself, though, unless the searchers were particularly incompetent, it was unlikely that she was the target, considering that she hadn't been anywhere near the Storm Coast. Olivia and Leliana eventually decided to leave the search to Leliana's agents and go meet the mages at Redcliffe.

The first sign that something was, once again, wrong in Redcliffe was the mini-rift just outside the gates of the village. The land seemed to have recovered from the Blight- it was almost odd to see greenery around the village- but something was very wrong with the people. "Seriously," Olivia said to Valena, down in the smithy, which she'd taken over after her father died. "The Arl just- left? Why would Teagan do that?"

"I don't know," said Valena. "But first these Tevinter magisters show up, and then suddenly Arl Teagan said he had to leave. The kid, Connor, is back, with the rebel mages, but, well…"

"He's too brainwashed to be any help?" said Olivia.

Valena nodded in agreement. "Also most people don't trust him because of, you know, the zombies."

"That would also be a reason. Where is this magister, anyway?"

"In the tavern. Along with the Grand Enchanter."

Olivia nodded. "Thanks." She walked out of the smithy. "It was nice to see you again," she called over her shoulder, making her voice sound lighthearted. "It was good to catch up." What? She could do subtle.

In the tavern, they were greeted by Grand Enchanter Fiona. Who then looked surprised and asked why they had come to Redcliffe. Which was odd, considering that she was the one who had invited them. In person. "You asked us here," said Olivia. "In Val Royeax?"

The Grand Enchanter looked even more confused. "You must be mistaken. I haven't been to Val Royeax since before the Conclave."

Olivia could do subtle, but this was just confusing. Even with a magister here, why would Fiona lie about inviting her? It wasn't like she'd snuck off to Val Royeax; somebody would have noticed. "Unless you have an identical twin, I'm pretty sure it was you."

Fiona looked down. "Whoever or whatever brought you here, the situation has changed. The free mages have already pledged themselves to the Tevinter Imperium."

And now Redcliffe was apparently a Tevinter outpost. Olivia barely refrained from groaning. "Andraste's ass," muttered Varric. "I'm trying to think of a single worse thing you could have done."

Solas nodded in agreement with Varric. "I know that you're afraid, but surely you deserve better than slavery to Tevinter." Olivia had to agree with both of them. Of course, the magister had probably used mind control. That would also explain why Teagan would abandon the people he was responsible for.

Fiona spoke again. "As one indentured to a magister, I no longer have the authority to negotiate with you." Maybe they'd just threatened her. She did look pretty scared.

"Well, who does then?" asked Olivia. The back of her mind was screaming 'be subtle'.

At that point two men in Tevinter robes walked down the stairs. They had obviously been listening in to the conversation. "Welcome, my friends," said the older man. "I apologize for not greeting you earlier."

"Agents of the Inquisition, allow me to introduce Magister Gereon Alexius," said Fiona.

"The southern mages are under my command," said Alexius. Olivia resisted the urge to frown. Something about that statement just rubbed her the wrong way. "And you are the survivor, yes? The one from the Fade? Interesting."

"Interesting alliance you've got here," said Olivia. It was probably better than calling it a hostile invasion, considering that she was currently in the town that had been taken over and cut off from backup. "I'd like to hear more about it."

"Of course. What do you want to know?"

"Hey," she said, as if she had just noticed, "where's Teagan, anyway? I haven't seen any sign of him or his men around."

"The Arl of Redcliffe left the village," said Alexius simply. "There were… tensions. I did not want an incident."

Translation: Teagan objected to Tevinter taking over Redcliffe and Alexius got rid of him. Olivia hoped that Teagan was safe and currently getting reinforcements to retake the village rather than dead or mind controlled. "That's not the point of this visit, anyway," she announced. "I need mages to help me close the Breach."

"Right down to business," Alexius smiled and gestured to one of the tables. Fiona glared at him. "Please be seated."

"Of course," said Olivia politely, sitting down across from him.

"Felix, bring a scribe," called Alexius to the other Tevinter man with him. "Oh, excuse my bad manners. This is my son, Felix." Felix bowed and left. "I'm surprised you came here," Alexius said to Olivia. "Closing the Breach is a feat not many could even attempt."

Olivia shrugged and leaned back. "Well, I like to think big."

Alexius leaned forward. "There will have to be-" he cut himself off and Felix came back, stumbling. "Felix!"

Olivia leapt up and caught the younger Tevinter as he collapsed, slipping something into her pocket. "I'm so sorry, my lady, please forgive me."

Alexius looked worried. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, father," said Felix, clutching his side.

"I'll get your powders," said Alexius. "Please excuse me, friends. We must continue this discussion another time."

Alexius left, carefully helping Felix walk out with him, followed by Fiona. Olivia looked at the bit of paper that Felix had slipped her. "Come to the Chantry," she read aloud. "You are in danger."

"Because that doesn't stink of a trap at all," said Varric.

Olivia smirked. "Let's go anyway."

There was a rift in the chantry. A very strange rift. While Olivia and the others got rid of the demons her timing was somehow off, like everything was happening too quickly and too slowly in turns.

There was also someone else in the chantry. "Good," said the elegantly dressed and coiffed young man once the demons were gone. "Help me close this rift, would you?"

Olivia shrugged and held up the mark, closing it in the usual stream of green light. "Fascinating," said the man. "How does that work, exactly?" Then he laughed. "You don't even know, do you? You just wiggle your fingers and boom! Rift closes."

Olivia felt a bit like she ought to be insulted. "Sorry, who are you exactly?"

"Ah, getting a bit ahead of myself, I see. Dorian of house Pavus, most recently of Minrathos. How do you do?"

Cassandra didn't look happy. "Another Tevinter. Be careful with this one."

Dorian only laughed. "Suspicious friends you have. Alexius used to be my mentor, so I'm sure my help ought to be useful. Look, you must know there's danger here. That should be obvious even without the note."

"You think?" asked Olivia sarcastically.

"Let's start with Alexius claiming the allegiance of the rebel mages out from under you. As if by magic, yes? Which is exactly what happened. To get to Redcliffe before you, Alexius reordered time itself."

Olivia stared at him. Just when she thought that things could not possibly become any stranger. "What?"

"That is fascinating, if it's true," said Solas. "And almost certainly dangerous."

"You saw how the rift here twisted time around itself?" asked Dorian. "Slowed some things up and others down? Soon there will be more like it, further and further away from Redcliffe. The magic Alexius is using is wildly unstable and it is unraveling the world."

Olivia seriously wondered about why people did some of these things. "Alright, why?"

"I can tell you." Felix walked in through the doors. Dorian looked particularly happy to see him. "My father's joined a cult, the Venatori. Whatever he's done for them, he's done to get to you. They're obsessed with you. I don't know why. Maybe because you survived the explosion at the Conclave."

"Or it's because you can close the rifts," added Dorian. "They might see that as a threat. I have to leave Redcliffe before Alexius realizes that I'm here, but when you deal with him I want to be there." Dorian turned to leave. "Oh, and Felix? Don't get yourself killed."

"There are worse things than dying, Dorian," said Felix darkly. He turned and left in the other direction.

"I think," said Olivia. "That we need to go back to Haven to discuss this."


	3. Chapter 3

In Which There is Time Travel

Back in Haven, Olivia met with Leliana, Cullen, and Josephine. "This," she said, "is no longer just about getting allies to close the Breach. Not only has a Tevinter magister taken over a Ferelden town, there is also the distinct probability that if we do not stop him soon he will rip a hole in time to go with the hole in the sky. It's obviously a trap, but I have to meet with him and get inside that castle."

"But we don't have the manpower to take the castle," pointed out Cullen. "Redcliffe is one of the most defensible fortresses standing. If you go in, you'll die. I won't allow it." Olivia looked at him suspiciously. "Because we'll lose our only means of closing the rifts," he added quickly. "We'd simply never be able to take the castle in a frontal assault."

"Good thing there's more than one way into the castle," said Olivia, smirking at Leliana, who seemed to realize what she was getting at. "What do you think the odds are that Alexius knows about the secret passage?"

Leliana smiled. "You go in the front gate as a distraction, and my agents go in through there."

"Secret passage?" asked Cullen.

"We used it one time during the Blight. Teagan showed it to us," explained Olivia.

"That plan could actually work," admitted Cullen.

"Especially since you'll have me." Dorian, who Olivia hadn't even realized was in Haven, threw the doors dramatically open and strode through. "Your spies will never get past Alexius' magic without my help. I'm coming, too."

"When did you even get here?" asked Olivia. He didn't answer. Oh well, it was a rhetorical question, anyway.

Everything went perfectly with the Inquisition's counter-trap, right up until Alexius realized that they knew about the time magic and began monologing about how the Breach was a mistake and Olivia had stolen the mark from someone called the 'Elder One'.

"Father, are you even listening to yourself?" asked Felix incredulously. "Don't you know what you sound like?"

"He sounds like exactly the sort of villainous cliché that everyone expects us to be," said Dorian, coming out from behind a pillar.

That set Alexius off again. This time he was monologing about how he'd given Dorian a chance to become part of this and the 'Elder One' would 'raise the Imperium from its own ashes'.

"Uh, huh," said Olivia. "And who is this 'Elder One' exactly? A mage?"

"Soon he will become a god!" Lovely. And Alexius was monologing again.

"This is exactly what we talked about never wanting to happen!" said Dorian. "Why are you doing this?"

"Let's just go home, Father," added Felix.

"No! He can save you! It's the only way! The Elder One promised. If I undo the mistake at the Temple…"

"Father, you need to accept that I'm dying," said Felix desperately.

Alexius ignored him. "Venatori, seize them!" It was only then that he looked around at the room and saw Leliana's agents and all the dead Venatori. At least the monologing had kept him distracted. He looked furious. "You are a mistake! You should never have existed!" Alexius pulled out a necklace made up of bluish-green glowing cube on a chain. Light began to swirl around the cube.

"NO!" shouted Dorian, shooting a bolt of energy at Alexius, who dropped the necklace. A swirling bluish-green vortex burst out of the cube. Olivia had just enough time to think that swirling vortices were never a good thing before she and Dorian fell through.

They landed in at least a foot of water in what looked like the Redcliffe dungeons. "Wetter than I remember," Olivia muttered, picking herself up. "And filled with a lot more red lyrium," she added staring at the balefully glowing spikes of lyrium growing out of the walls.

"Displacement?" muttered Dorian. "Interesting. It's probably not what Alexius intended, but the rift must have moved us to… what? The closest confluence of arcane energy?"

"Never mind that," said Olivia. "Unless this is what the basement looked like when you came through with the agents, we have a serious problem. Namely, when are we and how do we get back?"

"Excellent questions!" said Dorian cheerfully. "We'll have to find out, won't we?" Olivia decided that he was way too enthusiastic for someone who had just been involuntarily temporally displaced. She sighed.

The question of 'when were they' was soon answered. They found Grand Enchanter Fiona a couple cells from the room where they had arrived. With red lyrium growing out of her body. She didn't tell them much, but they also found Varric, Cassandra, and Leliana locked in other cells. From talking to them, they managed to gather two things. First, that only a year had passed and second, that the world had basically fallen apart completely in the intervening time. According to Cassandra, first Empress Celene Of Orlais had been assassinated and then the 'Elder One' had attacked with an army of demons. The Breach had gotten big enough that it covered everything.

The only news that could be considered 'good' under any circumstances was that Alexius was still in the castle, along with the necklace that he had used to send Olivia and Dorian through time. When they found him in his throne room he was a complete wreck, completely alone except for a ghoul. It was almost anticlimactic.

"I knew you would come," said Alexius. "Not that you would appear now, specifically, but I knew I hadn't destroyed you. My final failure."

"Was it worth it?" shouted Dorian. "Everything you did to the world? To yourself?"

"It doesn't matter now," said Alexius. "All we can do is wait for the end."

Well, that was a bit of a defeatist attitude. "We can go back and prevent this, though," said Olivia.

"How many times have I tried?" said Alexius. "The past cannot be undone. All that I fought for, all that I betrayed, and what have I wrought? Ruin and Death. There is nothing else. The Elder One comes. For you, for me, for us all."

"Well, maybe you can't change what's happened," Olivia pointed out. "But your past is our present and your present is our future. Changing the future is easy."

"Enough!" Leliana grabbed the ghoul.

"Felix!" Shouted Alexius.

Dorian looked horrified. "That's Felix? Alexius, what have you done?"

"He would have died, Dorian," wailed Alexius. "I saved him! Please," he begged Leliana. "Don't hurt my son. I'll give you anything you ask."

"Help us get back to our own time and we'll let him go," Olivia said.

"Let him go and I'll give you everything you want!"

"I want the world back," snarled Leliana as she cut Felix's throat.

"No!" screamed Alexius, sending Leliana flying into a pillar and turning on the others. Olivia groaned and stabbed Alexius with a sword she'd picked up downstairs. She honestly hadn't expected Leliana, of all people, to go and kill a hostage, potentially jeopardizing their plan to get Olivia and Dorian back to their own time.

Dorian looked sadly at Alexius' body. "He wanted to die, didn't he? All the lies he told himself, the justifications… He lost Felix long ago and didn't even notice." Dorian took the necklace with the glowing cube from Alexius' neck. "This is the amulet he used before. Give me an hour to figure out what spell he used and I can use it to reopen the rift in time that sent us here."

"We don't have an hour!" cried Leliana. "The Elder One will be here any minute!" Olivia refrained from pointing out that if they were so short on time then perhaps she shouldn't have made the only person who knew the spell attack them, partially because Leliana had obviously been through a lot and partially because at that moment the entire room shook. "The Elder One," said Leliana darkly.

Varric and Cassandra nodded at each other. "We'll hold the main door. After that it's all up to you, Nightingale."

Olivia honestly felt like crying. "I swear to you that we won't let this happen."

"Good," said Leliana. "The only way we live is if this day never comes." She, Varric, and Cassandra turned toward the doors of the hall. "Go. You have as much time as I have arrows."

Varric and Cassandra walked grimly from the room while Leliana positioned herself in the center of the hall with bow drawn. Dorian and Olivia moved as far away from the doors and he started doing something to the cube that made a familiar swirling light begin to appear around it.

The doors crashed open. All that could be seen behind them were demons stepping over Varric and Cassandra's bodies into the hall. Olivia couldn't make herself look away from Leliana standing between the horde and herself and Dorian with the slowly growing portal, praying as she shot one arrow after another into a mass of enemies that never thinned until the demons reached her and she began fighting them hand-to-hand. Olivia unconsciously took as step toward her friend but Dorian grabbed her arm. "You move and we all die!" He threw the necklace into the air. Just as the vortex opened to suck them both in, Leliana fell to the ground with her throat cut.

When Olivia and Dorian fell out of the portal back into their own time, Alexius looked shocked. "You'll have to do better than that," quipped Dorian.

Alexius sank to his knees. "You won. There's no point continuing this charade." He looked miserably at Felix. "You'll die."

"Everyone dies," said Felix gently.

Two of Leliana'a agents picked Alexius up and dragged him away. He didn't seem to have the will to move. "Well, I'm glad that's over with," said Dorian. He sounded far too cheerful for it to be honest.

At that moment the doors to the hall opened and armored men began to march in. "Or not," said Dorian

"Dorian," said Olivia, "have you ever heard the phrase 'famous last words'? They're probably Alexius' backup."

As it turned out, Olivia didn't need to be so worried, because once the armored men had marched in and surrounded the room they were followed by Alistair and Bethany. "Never mind," said Olivia. "They're our backup. Teagan must have been going for help, after all. I guess this means he's all right." He was there, too, in fact, standing behind Alistair and looking furious.

Dorian looked skeptical. "Are you sure about that? Because they don't look too friendly. The king there looks pretty pissed off, in fact."

Olivia did have to concede that point, but Alistair wasn't very likely to attack them. He glared at Grand Enchanter Fiona. "Grand Enchanter. Imagine my surprise when I heard that you'd given Redcliffe Castle to a Tevinter magister. Especially considering that I'm pretty certain it belongs to Arl Teagan and not you."

"Your Majesty! We never planned to…" Fiona looked miserable and guilty. Olivia could recognize the expression as the same 'I have done something I know is wrong and am now getting called out on it' look that Margaret got when Olivia caught her doing something wrong. Olivia had been sure that was exclusively a five-year-old-facing-disapproving-mother thing, but apparently not.

"I know what you planned," said Alistair angrily. "I wanted to help you! And now you've made that impossible. Grand Enchanter, you and those who follow you are no longer welcome in Ferelden."

Fiona looked horrified. "But there are hundreds of us! Where would we go?"

Olivia felt that this was a good place to cut in. "Come with me," she said, walking forward and smiling. "We do still need mages to close the Breach, after all."

"Again?" questioned Alistair. "I'd take Olivia's offer, if I were you," he added to Fiona. "Either way, you're leaving Ferelden."

"All right," said Fiona. "We'd have to be stupid to not agree."

Once back in Skyhold, they headed for the Breach immediately after arriving. "Ready?" Olivia asked Fiona, standing next to her beneath the glowing green sky. The Grand Enchanter nodded, signaling to the other mages. Magic swirled around the crater, feeding into Olivia. She raised her hand up to the Breach, a jet of green light shooting out of it and connecting them. Energy poured through her until she felt something that could only be described as a snap and the Breach, leaving only a scar of green light across sky.


	4. Chapter 4

In Which the Enemy is Revealed

After the Breach was sealed, Olivia would have hoped to have at least a day or so to celebrate and recover. As it turned out, however, it was only about five hours before an army could be seen across the valley, marching on Haven. Everyone immediately began scrambling to get the fighters armed and on the ramparts and the civilians evacuated into the chantry. Olivia was rather proud of the reaction time, considering that less than five minutes ago they had all been partying.

She ran down to the gates with Leliana. "What's the situation?"

"Well," said Cullen, "There is an army coming over the mountain. It seems safe to say that they aren't friendly."

Josephine seemed confused. "Under what banner?"

Cullen looked grim. "None." Personally, Olivia actually agreed with him for once. Whatever the reason for that, it couldn't be good.

Something began banging on the gates from the other side. "Open these! Please, I can't get in unless you open the gates!" That was kind of the point of having gates, but nobody mentioned it. Instead, the gates were cautiously opened enough to let a person through.

Outside was a thin young man wearing ordinary peasant's clothing and a very large hat. "I'm Cole. I came to warn you. To help. People are coming to hurt you. You probably already know." Normally, Olivia would assume that he was being sarcastic, but Cole spoke and moved in such a quick, jerky, nervous way that it sounded self-deprecating than anything else.

"Do you know who's attacking?"

"Templars are coming to kill you."

"Templars? Attacking blindly is the Order's response to our talks with the mages?" Cullen sounded betrayed.

"The red Templars went to the Elder One," said Cole. "You know him? He knows you. You took his mages. There." Cole pointed towards the cliffs across the valley. Olivia could see an unnaturally tall, thin figure standing silhouetted against the evening sky. "He's very angry that you took his mages."

Cullen actually swore. "Haven isn't a fortress. We need to hit them with the trebuchets before they get here. If we hit the mountain above them we can cause avalanches that will stop enough of them for us to be able to defend the village from the survivors."

Olivia looked at the approaching force. There was an incredibly suspicious figure in the sky above the invader's heads. "Is that a dragon?" it came off a bit incredulous.

The others followed her gaze. "Never mind dragon, is that an archdemon?" asked Cullen.

Oh, that was it. "Well, I wouldn't know anymore, would I?" Olivia snapped at him. "We don't have any way of telling if it's an archdemon or not. What we do know, however, is that it is large, fire-breathing, and flies. The trebuchets aren't going to cut it. If they have a dragon, stopping most of their ground forces won't be enough. Everything in Haven except the chantry is made of wood, for the Maker's sake! To get all of the ground troops we'd have to bury Haven, as well. We need to evacuate."

"How? There's only one path."

At that point, Chancellor Roderik cut in. "No there isn't. There's a second path out. Around the back of the chantry. It's normally only used in summer because it gets covered in snow, but if someone were ever really desperate enough, like we are now…"

"And now we have a plan! Roderik leads out everyone except me, so I can man the last trebuchet for the final avalanche."

Cullen looked horrified. "That's suicidal!"

"Which is why I'm not running away and letting someone else do it instead," said Olivia seriously.

Cullen looked unhappy, but nodded. "Maybe you'll find a way. You always have before."

That didn't seem very likely, but Olivia didn't really want to mention it. She nodded and ran off down the road.

Olivia sat waiting for about five minutes by the trebuchet before someone came up behind her. "You really thought we were going to let you do this alone?"

Olivia frowned at the sudden appearance of Varric, Solas, and Cole. "What are you three doing here?"

"You're the one with the mark," explained Solas.

"I want to help," said Cole.

"I'm just scared of your husband," Varric announced. "The scary, scary ex-Antivan Crow? I like myself like I am- by which I mean not assassinated. Besides, Hawke would be pretty mad if I left you here to die."

Olivia sighed. She wasn't getting rid of them. "Help me get the trebuchet into position, then."

The instant that Olivia had finished aiming the trebuchet, the dragon appeared again in the sky. She had a bad feeling about this. The feeling only got worse when the dragon began to turn toward them. Olivia looked at the others, standing behind her. "Run. Now." She turned and began to take her own advice, but the dragon swooped low, breathing fire down on the ground next to her. Which probably wouldn't have stopped her, but the flames also hit the stacks of crates leaning against the cliff nearby and apparently whatever was in them was explosive.

Olivia was lifted up into the air and flung at least ten feet away by the blast. She groaned. She'd hit her head on the ground, there was shrapnel embedded in her side, and it felt like a couple of her ribs were cracked. As she slowly struggled back mostly upright, she saw an unnaturally tall figure coming through the flame, resolving into something that vaguely a person with a twisted face whose whole body had been stretched.

This seemed like a good time to leave. Olivia turned to run, but the dragon landed on her other side, cutting off her escape route. It roared at her, and she backed away, aware the entire time that she was heading toward the… whatever-he-was behind her. "Enough!" The person's? Creature's? voice sounded exactly like the eerie voice from the crater, if less echoey. "Pretender. You toy with forces beyond your ken. No more."

Olivia glared at him defiantly. Cornered like this, it was what she had left. "Whatever you are, you don't scare me!"

"Words mortals often hurl at the darkness. Once they were mine. They are always lies."

"Because yours were?"

He did not seem to be paying any attention to her interjections into his monologue. "Know me. Know what you have pretended to be."

"I'm pretty sure I never pretended to be whatever you are."

"Exalt the Elder One! The will that is Corypheus!"

"You're Corypheus? Man, Hawke was right, you are ugly."

Corypheus pointed at her. "You will kneel."

Olivia thought about the Templars, and…pretty much everything that had happened to her before the Wardens. "I'm through kneeling," she snarled.

Corypheus didn't seem to care. "You will resist. You will always resist. It matters not." He pulled some sort of orb out of one of the pocket in his robes. It began to glow with a mixture of red and green light. "I am here for the anchor. The process of removing it begins now." He reached out, hand glowing, and the mark on Olivia's palm began to burn and glow. "It is your fault, 'Herald'," snarled Corypheus. "You interrupted a ritual years in the planning and, instead of dying, you stole its purpose." Olivia would have made a smart comeback at that, but the mark felt like it was on fire. "I do not know how you survived, but what marks you as 'touched', what you flail at the rifts, I crafted to assault the very heavens." Corypheus clenched his fist and the mark glowed brightly, burning with pain and making Olivia stagger and collapse on hands and knees. "And you used the anchor to undo my work. The gall!"

"That sounds like me," Olivia gasped.

"The anchor is meant to bring certainty where there is none. For you, the certainty that I would always come for it." Corypheus strode forward, lifting Olivia into the air by the wrist of the marked hand and looking her straight in the face. "I once breached the fade in the name of another, to serve the Old Gods of the Empire in person. I found only chaos and corruption. Dead whispers. For a thousand years I was confused. No more. I have gathered the will to return under no name but my own, to champion withered Tevinter and correct this Blighted world. Beg that I succeed, for I have seen the throne of the gods and it was empty." With that, he flung Olivia away and she landed hard against one of the trebuchet's supports. She slid down, pretty sure that another couple ribs were cracked. "The anchor is permanent," said Corypheus. "You have spoiled it with your stumbling." Despite the situation and severe pain she was in, Olivia smirked and pulled herself to her feet, grabbing a sword from where it was lying on the trebuchet. "So be it," announced Corypheus. "I will begin again, find another way to give this world the nation-and god- it requires. And you. I will not suffer even an unknowing rival. You must die." Olivia looked up at where the trebuchet was aimed, still set to create an avalanche.

Slowly, she backed toward the firing mechanism of the trebuchet. "You think we're going to give up? I told you, we've had enough of kneeling. This isn't over. You'll face us all, yet. When we choose." Ignoring the pain, she spun around and kicked at the trebuchet, sending its load firing straight at the mountain. Corypheus turned and, for an instant, stared in shock at the mass of ice, rock, and snow that was coming crashing down toward them, before the dragon picked him up in its claws and took flight. Olivia jumped between the cracks in the platform the trebuchet was standing on, landing in one of the tunnels beneath Haven as the avalanche roared over the spot where she had been standing.


	5. Chapter 5

In Which The Inquisition Finds a New Base

The tunnel was dark, the only light coming from the mark on Olivia's hand. With a groan, she struggled to her feet. Everything hurt. She pulled out one of the healing potions stored on her belt and downed the entire thing in a gulp before beginning to stagger down the tunnel on a leg that she was pretty sure was broken, shivering in the cold.

By the time Olivia caught up to the others, her leg was killing her and she was cold enough that she was about ready to start flinging fireballs purely for the warmth. She collapsed on her knees at the edge of the tents to the surprised shouts of the lookouts.

They practically carried her to the medical tent they had set up.

"Thank the Maker you're all right," said Cullen quietly. "I honestly thought we'd lost you."

"Am I the only one who expected her to come back?" asked Leliana rhetorically of thin air.

"Now we just need a plan to deal with Corypheus," said Cassandra.

"With what? We don't even have a base of operations anymore," said Josephine. Cassandra glared at her and took a breath.

Mother Giselle, who was treating Olivia's leg glared at the four of them. "Go away and stop bothering my patients!" They wandered away from the tent, still arguing. Olivia lay backward and sank into sleep.

Hours later, when Olivia woke up, they were still disagreeing on a course of action. Olivia struggled to a seated position in cot in the medical tent.

Mother Giselle put a hand on Olivia's shoulder. "Lie down. You need to rest."

"How long have they been at this? They're just recycling the same arguments they were making before I fell asleep."

"At least they can, thanks to you." Mother Giselle sighed. "With no immediate danger we turn to blaming on another. This infighting could destroy us before Corypheus ever gets a chance."

Olivia groaned. "This bickering isn't helping anything."

"Our leaders struggle because of what our survivors witnessed," said Mother Giselle softly. "We saw our defender stand…and fall. And now we have seen her return. You slew the archdemon and lived, and now you have survived facing Corypheus. The more beyond us the enemy is, the more miraculous your actions appear, and the more our trials seem ordained. That is hard to accept, is it not? What 'we' have been called to endure? What 'we', perhaps, must come to believe?"

"I can see where they're coming from in," admitted Olivia. "Corypheus claims to be one of the magisters who assaulted the Golden City. One of the first darkspawn. It's probably true. Hawke certainly believes it."

"If it is, then Corypheus is a monster beyond imagining. All mankind continues to suffer for what he claims to have done. If even part of it is true, then all the more reason for Andraste to choose someone to rise against him."

"And everyone has decided that someone is me." Olivia felt tired. "I understand why they would. Honestly, everything that has happened to me over the course of the past ten years or so is such an unlikely set of coincidences that it makes even me suspect divine intervention. The thing is, though, I want to believe. I want to believe that I this is all the Maker's will, because maybe if it is, then that means that maybe I can actually succeed. And the more I want to believe, the more suspicious I am of any belief that sneaks up on me. It feels too good to be true."

Over by the firepit Cullen, Leliana, Josephine, and Cassandra seemed to have given up arguing. Oliva struggled out of the cot and limped over to them. Cassandra was staring obsessively over a map while Cullen stood awkwardly by a tent. Josephine sat on a bench, head in her hands, Leliana on the ground next to her staring into the fire, knees pulled tight to her chest. Olivia opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again, wordlessly. They all looked so defeated. Olivia didn't know what to say. Mother Giselle, it seemed, did. From behind Olivia the cleric's rich voice sang out in the first words of an old, old song. Shadows fall, and hope has fled, steel your heart, the dawn will come… Leliana looked up. The night is long, and the path is dark... Josephine took her head out of her hands, seeming surprised. Look to the sky… Cassandra stopped poring over the map and looked up, staring into the distance. Look to the sky, for one day soon, the dawn will come…Leliana's familiar voice joined in the song, and Olivia suddenly felt immensely comforted to hear it. The shepherd's lost, and his home is far, keep to the stars… Other people from around the camp were beginning to gather around. Some of them began singing as well. The dawn will come, the night is long… Cullen looked up from the patch of ground he had been staring at. And the path is dark…now he was singing as well. Look to the sky, for one day soon…by this point, Olivia was pretty certain that there couldn't be more than one or two people in the entire camp who weren't singing. The dawn will come… One of the men gathering around the fire walked over to Olivia and knelt, followed by several others directly behind him. Bare your blade, and raise it high, stand your ground, the dawn will come, the night is long, and the path is dark, look to the sky, for one day soon, the dawn will come… All the people who had been wallowing alone in misery moments before were standing together, singing the same song. For once, Olivia didn't really know how to react. "An army needs more than an enemy," said Mother Giselle quietly. "It needs a cause." The song was over and the crowd was breaking up, but instead of going back to solitary unhappiness, the people were talking and chattering.

"A word?" Olivia jumped, then followed Solas to the edge of the cliff the camp was on. He lit a brazier with veilfire, staring out over the cliff's edge.

"What is it?" she asked.

"The orb that Corypheus had. It is elven. It is what he used to open the Breach and what caused the explosion. I don't know how he survived yet. Or how people will react when they find out where the orb came from."

Olivia winced. "I see what you mean. People love to have scapegoats and the elves could be an easy target for their blame."

Solas nodded. "There are, however, things that we can do to prevent people getting distracted with assigning blame."

"Such as?"

"When he attacked the Inquisition, Corypheus changed it, gave it a new purpose. And he also changed you. The way these people see you. They look up to you now even more than they did before."

"Is this going somewhere?"

"Guide them. Send scouts to the north. There is an old elven fortress there that sits empty waiting for a new force to come to claim it. A place where the Inquisition can grow."

Olivia looked backward at the camp. Having a destination would be a very good thing, especially an unclaimed fortress for the now-homeless Inquisition and citizens of Haven to take up residence. "I hope you're right about this place."

True to Solas's word, a fortnight after they had left the overrun and mostly destroyed Haven and begun travelling north, Olivia and the group of scouts she was travelling ahead with came to a snow-covered chasm with an old but still serviceable stone bridge across it, leading to the gates of a large fortress. The place was timeworn and with a few damaged walls and fallen-in roofs, but still it managed to look strong and majestic where it sat across the chasm.

"Impressive," Olivia muttered quietly to herself. She was certainly impressed.

Next to her, Solas was smiling. "Skyhold."

"That's a good name for it," said Olivia, still amazed by the sight. "It fits."

The Inquisition settled into Skyhold quickly, setting up tents, repairing the buildings, picking out uses for the various rooms, and moving in their supplies.

When the confusion has settled down a bit, Olivia found Solas, Cassandra, and Vivienne standing around in the lower courtyard arguing about the strange young man who had come to warn them about Corypheus's approach. "Don't you three have something better to do than argue?"

"NO," answered all three of them at once.

"It's a spirit, not a stray puppy you can keep as a pet," complained Vivienne, gesturing at Cole, who was a few feet away, apparently helping with the wounded from the fight at Haven. "It has absolutely no business here."

"I'd think you would say the same thing about an apostate," pointed out Solas.

"What is this about, anyway?" asked Olivia.

"I'd been wondering if Cole might be a mage, considering his odd abilities," explained Cassandra. "But apparently not."

"He can cause people to overlook or entirely forget him," said Solas. "A mage couldn't do that. It appears that Cole is actually a spirit."

"A demon," said Vivienne, glaring at him.

"It's more complicated than that."

"He did warn us about Corypheus," pointed out Olivia.

"At what cost?" Vivienne asked. "How many people will he end up killing later?"

"The situation is more complicated than that," said Solas. "Not only because he helped us. Ordinary spirits enter this world by possessing someone, with the result being monstrous in appearance. But Cole looks like an ordinary young man."

"So is he possessing someone or not?" asked Cassandra.

"No," said Solas. "He has possessed no-one yet looks completely human, something that should be an impossibility. He is entirely unique. Moreover, he wishes to help us. I would suggest allowing him to do so."

"Which is what Vivienne was objecting to," said Olivia. "I think that I have to agree with Solas."

"Thank you."

"Provisionally. I've met helpful spirits before with odd ideas of what constitutes help." Exhibit A: Justice. "I'm going to go talk to him. And if he seems all right I'll still be keeping an eye on him."


	6. Chapter 6

In Which There are Speeches and Meetings

News of the new location also got out nearly as quickly as they had moved in, and people from outside the Inquisition began to show up. Of course, the main problem with this was that if all of these random visitors knew where to find them, then Corypheus must know as well, something which Cassandra was quick to point out.

"Skyhold is becoming a pilgrimage destination," Cassandra commented while she and Olivia were standing in the courtyard watching people arrive through the gates. "If all of these people know where we are, then Corypheus must as well."

Olivia nodded. "Yes. Of course, it was inevitable that he would find out at some point. It's practically impossible to hide the whereabouts of such a large number of people for long. Unless you move around a lot, but that isn't very practical for our purposes."

"We have enough people and fortifications to put up a fight here, but the scale of this war is larger than anticipated."

"To put it lightly."

"Still, now at least we know why Corypheus came after you," continued Cassandra, beginning to head up the steps to the upper level of the courtyard."

"Ah, the mysterious glowey mark on my hand," said Olivia, following her.

"It's more than that," said Cassandra. "Because of your decisions, we were able to close the Breach." They had reached the stairway to the doors of the keep.

Olivia frowned. "Is this going somewhere? Because I have a feeling that this is becoming a monologue, and those tend to precede dramatic moments."

Cassandra continued speaking. "And it was because of your determination that we were able to escape from Haven. You are a threat to Corypheus because of what you, as a person, have done, and everyone here knows it." They had reached the landing to find Leliana standing on it, dramatically holding a large ceremonial sword. "The Inquisition needs a leader," Cassandra said as Olivia joined her and Leliana on the landing. "The one who has already been leading it." Olivia turned around to see a large crowd growing below the stairway. "You," finished Cassandra with finality, to make herself clear.

Olivia glanced back at the crowd. "Did everyone know about this except for me?" she asked.

"Yes," answered Leliana, slight amusement on her face.

"The Inquistion wouldn't even exist without you," said Cassandra. "What it does must be your decision."

Olivia turned to the two of them. "How in the world did we all come this far?" she asked rhetorically, reaching for the sword in Leliana's hands. She grasped the sword's hilt and looked at it slowly, noting absently that, while pretty and dramatic-looking, she wouldn't want to use it in battle. "I'll... try to think about greater implications of making a mage, of all people, the leader of the Inquisition later. Right now, we have an enemy who wants to take over, and in the process destroy, the world. So we'll do what's right. Corypheus has to be stopped and the Inquisition will fight for everyone no matter what faction they're from." Holding the sword in front of her, she turned to look over the assembled crowd.

Cullen took the motion as a signal to begin what seemed to resemble most a pre-battle style pep talk, and everyone began cheering. Olivia internally shrugged and raised the sword dramatically over her head, automatically casting a quick, invisible Arcane Warrior spell to boost her strength so that she wouldn't embarrassingly have her arm start shaking or drop the gigantic ceremonial sword, which she suspected would be rather heavy for anyone except possibly a qunari.

"So," she muttered to Leliana after a couple seconds, "How long before I can put this thing down?"

"Just a bit longer," Leliana muttered back.

Olivia waited until she saw Cullen and Josephine begin to look a bit awkward where they stood among the cheering crowd before lowering the sword in front of her and resting the tip on the ground, something which she would never do with a sword that was meant for battle. Cassandra jumped down from the stairs and Olivia nodded at Leliana, the two of them turning and heading for the doors of the keep. Behind them, Cullen and Josephine quickly hurrying over to join them as Olivia dramatically pushed the doors open, the four of them walking into the great hall.

"So," said Cullen, looking around at the partially restored hall. "This is where it begins."

"It began in the courtyard," said Leliana softly. "This is where we turn that promise into action."

"How?" asked Josephine practically. "The only thing we know about Corypheus is that he wanted your mark."

"I know someone who knows more," came the voice of Varric as he stepped out of the shadows.

Leliana blinked at Varric. "Cassandra is going to kill you."

Olivia followed Varric out to the battlements, to find Hawke gazing down at the courtyard.

"So," said Olivia, joining her, "Corypheus."

"Corypheus."

"Anything new on him?"

"Beyond the fact that he can apparently come back from the dead?" Hawke gave a short laugh.

"Well, we already know that he's after my mark."

"And that he can influence, possibly control, the minds of Grey Wardens using the taint in their blood."

"Think that's why they've disappeared? Because Corypheus is controlling them?"

"It's possible. My friend- Stroud- he was looking into something unrelated for me- the red lyrium that drove Merideth crazy. Anyway, the last time he talked to me he was worried about corruption in the Grey Warden ranks."

Varric snorted. "I'd think that Corypheus would certainly count as corruption in the ranks."

"I'm not so sure the red lyrium thing is so unconnected after all. When Corypheus attacked us at Haven, he had Templars with him who looked like they had been exposed to red lyrium. It was actually growing out of their bodies in some cases. And it was all over the place in that creepy alternate future that Dorian and I went to, where Corypheus had used an army of demons to essentially take over the world."

Hawke stared at her. "You… actually traveled in time? Varric mentioned that you had but I sort of had a hard time believing it. No offense Varric," she added, nodding toward the dwarf, "but it kind of resembled the plotline of one of your books more than anything else. I really should know better by now."

"Hey, I wouldn't believe it either if I hadn't actually been there when it happened and seen them disappear," said Varric.

Olivia smiled. "So, she said to Hawke. "Where's Stroud now? Or has he disappeared too?"

Hawke shook her head. "No, he's been hiding out in an old smuggler's cave in Crestwood."

Olivia sighed. "The Wardens that are probably being controlled by Corypheus. Do you think that there's something we could do to free them?"

"I don't know," admitted Hawke

Olivia looked back out over the courtyard below them. "It's just… right after the Blight, when we were still taking care of getting rid of the darkspawn stragglers that hadn't gone back into the Deep Roads and I was the Warden-Commander of Amaranthine? I had this… this team. New Wardens that I had recruited. Oghren was there, and that was good, it was his idea to become a Grey Warden in the first place and it didn't really change much from the way we were during the Blight, but the others… I was the one that talked them into joining. I mean, knowing them and the situations they had gotten themselves into before I met them, they would've all gotten themselves into trouble and probably dead on their own, but I made them into Grey Wardens and my subordinates. I was the one who just showed up and completely changed their fates. They were my responsibility. And I told myself, alright, they're grown adults, they can take care of themselves, they know what they're getting into by becoming Grey Wardens, if I hadn't turned up and given them the option they'd be dead. But there was still this feeling in the back of my mind, asking myself who I was to go and ask them to give up their own, admittedly probably fatal, paths and dedicate their lives to the Wardens. A part of me was always wondering just how arrogant I was to think that was any better than letting them get themselves killed on their own. Now if they aren't dead they're probably under mind control. Who gave me the right to get them into that?"

"Well, according to popular opinion, the Maker did," pointed out Hawke.

"Not helping. I mean it, what kind of horrible monster does it make me if I go around thinking that I know what's best for other people?"

"Eh, you haven't crossed over the line yet," said Hawke. "Just remember to keep what you just said in mind and you'll probably be fine." She shrugged, smiling. "You've really been waiting for a chance to get all that off your chest, haven't you? I think you were talking for five minutes straight. Better watch out, next you'll start monologue-ing. Now that's a real sign of evil."

Olivia laughed. "I'll try to contain the urge. So, Stroud's in Crestwood, huh? Think you could arrange a meeting?"

"That's doable. The area is apparently a real mess, though. He said something about walking corpses."

"It's always something, isn't it?" Predictably, only a few minutes after they had finished talking, Olivia had to go and rescue Varric from an enraged Cassandra. She found them in a side room off the inn, Cassandra pinning Varric to a wall and shouting at him. "You knew where Hawke was the entire time! You lied to me!"

Varric pushed her away, "Of course I did!"

"You…!" Cassandra swung a fist at him wildly.

Varric dodged the punch and rather sensibly moved to place a table between himself and Cassandra. "You kidnapped and interrogated me! What did you expect me to say? Did you actually think I was going to sell out my best friend to a random stranger who had me kidnapped and threatened with knives?"

Cassandra opened her mouth angrily, but Olivia stepped in before she could say anything. "All right, cut it out you two! Cassandra, leave Varric alone."

The seeker rounded on Olivia. "You're taking his side?" She turned back to glare at Varric again. "The Inquisition needed a leader! The Hero of Ferelden had disappeared," here, Cassandra gestured at Olivia, "so we went looking for Hawke and he was gone too! We were thinking that the disappearances were connected by some sort of nefarious plot, but that wasn't it. It was just you! The entire time! You purposely stopped us from finding Hawke! If she'd been there with us at the Conclave, maybe what happened there might have gone differently!"

"I was protecting my friend!" shouted Varric.

Cassandra did not look sympathetic. "Inquisitor, Varric is a liar and a snake. He didn't tell us where Hawke was even after what happened at the Conclave and he saw just how serious our plight was!"

Varric glared back at Cassandra. "She's here now. We're on the same side."

"We all know whose side you're on, Varric. It'll certainly never be the Inquisition's."

"That's enough, Cassandra," said Olivia quietly. "Do not condemn a man for loyalty."

Cassandra sighed and leaned against the table, not looking at either of them. "Just go, Varric."

The dwarf nodded shortly and headed for the stairs down from the room, hesitating at the top. "You know what I think? I think that if Hawke had been at the Conclave, she'd be dead, just like everyone else. You people have done enough to her." With that parting shot, he vanished down the staircase.

"I believed him," said Cassandra miserably. "He spun his story for me and I swallowed all of it. If I'd just explained, gotten through to him… But I didn't tell him why we needed Hawke, did I." She sunk down to sit on a chair.

"This isn't really about Varric of Hawke, is it?" asked Olivia, pulling a second chair around to face Cassandra and sitting down in it.

"No. It's about… I should have been smarter, more cautious. I don't deserve to be here," the seeker finished miserably.

Olivia smiled. "Have you looked around yourself at all? We're all fools here. We must all be completely mad to think that this has any chance of working, but here we are."

"Is this supposed to make me feel better?"

"Like you're in good company, at least."

"I don't regret anything."

"Good." Olivia got up and headed toward the stairs, leaving Cassandra smiling, just a bit.

Varric was back in his customary place standing by the wall of the main hall. "She's calmed down a bit."

"Define how much in terms of what she's punching now."

"Nothing, actually," said Olivia.

"I wasn't planning on keeping secrets," said Varric. "I told her what seemed important at the time."

"You don't have to justify yourself to me."

"I keep hoping that none of this is actually real. That it's all just some weird Fade shit that'll just disappear."

"Don't we all."

Crestwood did indeed contain walking corpses. In fact, it was nearly overrun with them. It was only after slogging through miles of mud and rain, killing dozens of possessed corpses, and being sidetracked by the need to stop the appearance of more, something which required capturing the local castle from bandits, using the machinery in the castle to open the dam and drain the lake, and poking about in the caves beneath the lake to find the fade rift that the demons had been coming from, that Olivia was finally able to focus on what she had come there for in the first place, namely finding Stroud.

The cave that the Warden was using as a base was a couple miles outside the town, the entrances boarded up with wooden planks forming a crude wall and rickety door.

As Hawke pushed open the makeshift door, Stroud looked up from a rickety table covered in papers, reaching for his sword before recognizing them. "It's just us."

"Hawke," he acknowledged. "And…" he looked at Olivia. "I'm not quite sure what I should call you, ma'am."

At one point, reflected Olivia, having too many titles for people to know what to call her wouldn't have been a problem she would have thought she would end up running into. She wasn't quite sure when that had changed. "Call me Inquisitor, I suppose," she said.

Stroud nodded. "I am at your service, Inquisitor."

"Well, I could certainly always use another ally. So, I hear that there's trouble in the Wardens. And that Corypheus might be involved."

"He is, I'm afraid," Said Stroud. "When Hawke slew him years ago, Weisshaupt was happy to put the matter to rest, but some weren't so sure it was as over as it seemed. The archdemon can survive being fatally wounded, after all, and I was afraid that Corypheus could as well. My investigation of the matter yielded clues to that effect, but no proof of anything. Then, every Warden in Orlais began to hear the Calling."

Hawke looked shocked. "Oh, Maker. Why didn't you say anything?"

"It was a Grey Warden matter. I had taken an oath not to tell anyone outside the Order about such things." Hawke didn't look happy, but she nodded in understanding anyway.

"They all suddenly heard the Calling?" asked Olivia. "All of them? At the same time?"

"Yes," said Stroud.

"So they think they're dying," said Hawke.

"More than that," Olivia said in realization. "They think that they're all dying at the same time. Every Warden. That there would be no-one left in Orlais to continue the Order leaving them completely helpless."

Hawke's eyes widened. "Corypheus isn't controlling them after all. He's using the Calling to make them afraid. So panicked they won't be thinking straight. Desperate people will do anything if they think it's the only way out. That's what happened in Kirkwall."

"Warden Commander Clarel proposed a blood-magic ritual to prevent future Blights from happening," explained Stroud. "And when I protested the plan as the madness it is my own comrades turned on me."

"So, what exactly are they planning?" asked Olivia.

"I'm not quite sure," admitted Stroud. "There are Wardens gathering at an old Tevinter ritual tower in the Western Approach. I'm hoping that going there might lead to answers."

"We should head there next, then."

"I'll meet you there," said Stroud.

Olivia frowned at him. "Is there some reason that you can't come with us?"

"Dramatics?"

"That's ridiculous. You're the one who did all the reconnaissance of this gathering. You're not getting yourself killed by demons or wild animals or bandits or Coypheus' Venatori cultists by trying to go out there alone."

Stroud sighed. "It would have been so dramatic." He turned to the table and began rolling up the papers. "I'll just pack up here, then."

Olivia raised her eyebrows at Hawke. "I'll help him get everything. And make sure that common sense prevails over melodrama. We'll meet you back at Skyhold."


	7. Chapter 7

In Which Certain Parties Take Their Time Arriving

For some unknown reason that likely involved either scouting or dramatics or both, it took a while for Stroud and Hawke to arrive at Skyhold, something which Olivia's various companions took great advantage of in order to complete, admittedly useful to the Inquisition but also personal, business. Or rather, to have Olivia complete said business while they tagged along.

"I know you said that the Seekers don't ingest lyrium," Olivia commented to Cassandra as the two of them along with Varric and Dorian walked up to the suspiciously silent Seeker fortress. "But they still could have been affected by the red stuff simply by being in close proximity to it for too long. Or they could have simply been overwhelmed by attackers from one faction or another."

"I need to know," the other woman said, opening the small wooden side door to the castle. "If they…" whatever Cassandra had been about to say was cut off as a man in Templar armor that had been standing just behind the doorway swung a sword at her only to be blasted back by one of Olivia's spells. Cassandra examined the body, frowning at it. "Promisers. I should have known." Olivia wasn't quite sure how Cassandra could tell at a glance that these Templars were 'Promisers', whatever that was, but decided not to question it. "The Promisers are a cult with rather strange ideas about the Seekers' role," she explained, noting the confused looks on the faces of everyone with her.

"What sort of strange ideas?" asked Olivia suspiciously. Any group described as a cult was probably up to no good.

"They want to destroy the world. Something about it being the only way to eradicate evil and if they succeed the world will be reborn as a paradise. No matter how many times we eradicate them, they keep coming back."

Olivia sighed. "Cultists. Of course."

They fought their way through a half dozen cultists up to a courtyard, where Cassandra found a bloodstained letter on one of the cultists that they had killed confirming that Corypheus had handed the Seekers over to the Promisers after finding the former resistant to red lyrium and therefore not useful to him. "Corypheus is working with the Promisers?" exclaimed Cassandra. "Does he not realize that they want to destroy the world?"

"I don't think he cares. He probably intends to betray them before they get very far."

"This doesn't explain how he caught the Seekers. Or what they did to them."

"It can't be anything good," Olivia warned her.

"I need to know anyway."

The group continued through the castle to the base of a wide flight of stairs somewhere on a higher level, at the base of which lay an obviously seriously wounded Seeker that Cassandra rushed up to. "Daniel!"

The man looked blearily up at her. "Cassandra? You're alive?"

"So are you. I'm so glad to see you." The man feebly attempted to wave Cassandra away, muttering blearily about them having put a demon in him. "You can't be possessed. That's impossible."

Daniel muttered something more, it becoming clear that he was referring to them having forced him to eat the red lyrium. "You have to find the Lord Seeker."

"Of course," said Cassandra.

"No, no… he betrayed us. Sent us here alone, one by one. Said it was an important mission. He's been here working with them the entire time."

Olivia frowned. "We met him in Val Royeau, though."

"That wasn't him. It was a demon. The Lord Seeker let the demon pretend to be him and take command while he came here instead." He coughed. "Don't leave me here like this."

Cassandra looked sad. "You should have come with me, Daniel. You didn't want fighting any more than I did."

Olivia and the others turned away as she drew her sword and brought it down. "He was my apprentice, you know. It's time to find Lord Seeker Lucius."

They found the Lord Seeker in an upper courtyard along with a couple other cultists.

Cassandra glared at him. "Lord Seeker Lucius." She said the name with complete disdain.

"Cassandra," he acknowledged. "And the new Inquisitor. You know, the Seekers were once the first Inquisition. We fought to restore order in a time of madness, just as you are doing. We became proud, sought to remake the world, to make it better. And what did we create? The Chantry, the Circles of Magi, and an unending war. The Seekers are an abomination. We created a decaying world and fought to preserve it even as it crumbled under the weight of its own flaws. We had to be stopped." Cassandra opened her mouth, likely to say something scathing. "If you don't believe me, then see for yourself." From somewhere, Lucius produced a thick, heavy tome with the Seekers' sigil on it and held it out to Cassandra. "The secrets of our Order passed down to me when my predecessor died. The war had already begun, but it wasn't too late for me to do the right thing. I have seen the future, created a new Order to replace the old, the world will end so we can start anew…" It was obvious that they weren't going to get anything more out of him except insane ranting. "…Join us, Cassandra, it is the Maker's will." Furiously, Cassandra drew her sword and attacked.

The Lord Seeker and the others were not very difficult to kill. Cassandra stared down at Lucius' body. "He was insane. He must have been. Corypheus' influence, perhaps." She bent down. "Let's go back to Skyhold. I want to see what's in this oh-so-secret book."

Cassandra split off to return to Skyhold while the other three headed off to finish more business, namely joining the Iron Bull and his mercenary company on the coast, where they would meet up with some of the Ben-Hassrath, also known as Qunari spies, and work with them to help a Qunari dreadnought get rid of some Venatori smugglers, and hopefully get Qunari's help with other Inquisition operations.

The plan, of course, went badly from the start. To begin with, it was raining when they arrived at the meeting point, followed by Dorian making snarky comments about the Qunari once Iron Bull's contact had arrived. Then, once the actual operation began it immediately went sideways.

There were two camps of Venatori that had to be defeated simultaneously in order for it to be safe for the dreadnaught to come in and take out the smugglers' ship, so they had to split their forces to attack, Olivia's party, Bull, and his contact, Gatt, all going after one camp while Bull's Chargers went after the other. Capturing the camps and lighting the signal fires telling the dreadnaught it was safe to proceed were simple. A little too simple, as it turned out.

As soon as the fires had been lit, another group of Venatori headed up toward the camp which the Chargers had captured. Olivia swore. "They can't defeat all of them. They'll be killed."

"Your men need to hold their position, Bull," said Gatt grimly.

"If they do that, they'll all be killed," said Bull, rounding on him.

"And if they don't, the Venatori will retake the camp and the dreadnaught will be destroyed," replied Gatt. "You'd be throwing away the Inquisition's alliance with the Qunari and declaring yourself Tal-vashoth. With all the help you've given the Inquisition, the Ben-Hassrath already think you've betrayed us. I stood up for you!"

"They're my men."

"I know, but you need to do what's right, for the alliance and the qun."

Bull looked at Olivia, indecision covering his face. "Call the retreat," she said quietly.

"No, don't!" shouted Gatt. Bull ignored him and sounded the signal for a retreat on his horn. Gatt looked horrified and stormed off while from the beach below them the Venatori mages set the dreadnaught aflame.

Back at Skyhold, Olivia found Cassandra in her usual haunt in the room off the inn, sitting at the table and staring at the book that she had gotten from the Lord Seeker. She looked terrible. "Are you all right?" asked Olivia. "What's wrong?"

"The rite of Tranquility."

"What about it?"

"What really began the rebellion was the discovery that it could be reversed, coming right after the shock of what happened in Kirkwall. It appears," she continued, gesturing at the book, "that we've always known how to reverse the rite."

Olivia's breath caught. "The entire time?"

"Since the beginning. We created the rite of Tranquility in the first place. I think at some point I told you about the vigil I went through before becoming a Seeker." Olivia vaguely remembered Cassandra saying something to that effect at some point, though she couldn't remember when. "I spent a month emptying myself of all emotion. I was made Tranquil, without even noticing. Then, at the end, the vigil summoned a spirit of Faith to touch my mind and it broke the Tranquility, giving me my powers. The Seekers knew exactly what they were doing the entire time and they didn't tell anyone, not me, not the Chantry, not even…" Cassandra cut herself off. "That's only the start. Lucius was right about the Order. I'd thought I would rebuild the Seekers once all this was over, but now I'm not sure it deserves rebuilding."

"What else was in the book?" asked Olivia, wondering exactly how much worse it could get.

Cassandra didn't answer the question. "At some point, power becomes it's own master." Whatever that meant. "We cast aside ideals in favor of expedience and tell ourselves it was necessary for the sake of the people. Is that going to happen to us, Inquisitor? Are we going to repeat history?"

Olivia sighed. "I ask myself that same question all the time. The Templars started out trying to protect people and ended up brutally oppressing the mages. It's so very, very easy to get so carried away with your own ideals that you've started to hurt innocent people."

"That's not exactly a comforting answer."

"It's the only one I've got. Still, if you do decide to rebuild the Seekers, then at least you'll know where it went wrong last time."

"No more secrets," said Cassandra.

"That's a start, at least."

A few hours after her conversation with Cassandra, Olivia was with Leliana going over reports from her scouts- read: spies- when a messenger showed up to tell them that Hawke and Stroud had finally arrived and that now they could finally go find out what the Wardens were doing in the Western Approach.


	8. Chapter 8

In Which A Plot is Revealed

The Western Approach was exactly as Olivia had expected it to be. Hot, sandy, and full of demons, wild animals, bandits, and Venatori cultists. "So," said Olivia, crowded around the table of maps at the Inquisiton's new camp with Head Scout Harding, Cassandra, Solas, Varric, Hawke, and Stroud. "Exactly where is this tower?"

Stroud pointed at a tiny mark miles away from the camp. "Over there."

"It just has to be on the other side of the desert, doesn't it?" asked Olivia rhetorically.

"What did you expect?" asked Hawke. "Convenience is practically defined as a thing that happens to other people."

"Well," Olivia sighed. "I suppose we should head out, then."

The tower was located on top of a large pillar of rock in a chasm, linked to the plain that they were standing on only by a stone bridge. It was in such ruin that it was quite easy to see that there was a small group of people. "There they are," said Stroud, looking across the bridge at the people in the tower. "From the looks of it, they may have already started the ritual."

"It certainly smells like they have," said Hawke. "Blood magic."

"We should hurry, then." Olivia walked swiftly forward, the others falling into step behind her.

When they reached the entrance to what had once been the ground floor of the tower but was now the only floor of the tower, the roof and half of the walls having fallen down, the none of the five people and two demons in group already there noticed their arrival. This was, Olivia considered, likely due to the fact that one of them, from the looks of him a Warden, was menacing a second man in a Warden uniform while the others stood around and watched.

"They're standing in a ring around him," muttered Hawke. "This is going to be difficult." A man in Tevinter robes was now monologing at the Warden about this- whatever it was- being what Warden-Commander Clarel had ordered and how his oaths demanded it. The Warden who had been threatening him reached for a knife. "Oh, no you don't." Hawke cast a spell and the imperiled man flew backward to the entrance where she was standing, knocking his would-be killer to the ground and being caught neatly by Hawke. "I love being a force mage," she said smugly.

"You've gotten better at that," commented Olivia appreciatively. "Nice job grabbing a single target instead of a whole group."

"Thanks."

The man she had just rescued seemed to be coming out of his shock at being nearly killed and then saved by a group of heavily armed strangers that had miraculously appeared out of the desert. "Oh, thank the Maker! They were going to kill me and use it to summon and bind a demon!"

"See?" said Hawke, setting the Warden upright. "Blood magic."

The man in Tevinter robes recovered quickly from his surprise at their sudden appearance. "Inquisitor. What a lovely surprise." He sounded smarmy.

"And who might you be?" asked Olivia, narrowing her eyes at him.

"Lord Livius Erimond Vyrantium, at your service." Even his name sounded smarmy. He bowed dramatically, as though he hadn't been just about to preside over the brutal murder of the Warden now standing behind Hawke.

"You aren't a Warden," said Stroud with hostility, stepping forward. "What are you doing here."

Erimond ignored the question. "But you are a Warden. The one Clarel let get away. So then you found the Inquisitor and came here to stop me. Shall we see how well that turns out for you?"

"I think the real question is how well this will go for you," said Olivia calmly. She turned to the Warden who had been about to kill the man Hawke had rescued; the only one who wasn't standing and gazing mindlessly into the distance from glowing eyes. "Since, I assume, you haven't noticed, your new friend here is currently serving an ancient Tevinter magister planning to purposely unleash a Blight. Which sounds a bit far-fetched, I know, but, really, it ought to be obvious that some outsider who wants you to murder your own comrades in order to summon demons is up to no good." The Warden backed slowly away, obviously confused.

"That's a very serious accusation there," said the magister. "What do the Wardens think of that, I wonder?" The two staring Wardens turned to look at Olivia's party. "They were so very afraid of the Calling. Enough that they would look anywhere for help."

"Even Tevinter," said Stroud with distaste.

"Indeed. And since it was my master who put the Calling into their heads in the first place…" at this point the indecisive Warden looked horrified and jumped away from his mesmerized comrades and the demons standing beside them. "…we were quite ready to give it," continued Erimond. "I went to Clarel, and we came up with a plan. Raise an army of demons, then march into the Deep Roads and kill all the Old Gods before they have a chance to awaken."

"So that's where the demon army came from. And I suppose the ritual has the side effect of putting the Wardens completely under your- or rather, Corypheus' control."

"Precisely! This was just a test. If the ritual worked here, the rest of the Wardens would use it and then the resulting army would conquer all of Thedas!"

"No you won't," snapped Olivia, reaching for her sword. "Because I'm going to stop you!"

"Ha!" Hawke let loose a spell that sent Erimond flying backward into the wall behind him while simultaneously flinging the demons and mind-controlled Wardens over the low, broken walls they were standing in front of and into the chasm.

"Or she will." Olivia raised her eyebrows at Hawke. "With one spell?"

"I did say I'd gotten better. Or maybe they were just particularly pathetic."

Olivia sighed. "It's too bad about the Wardens. Whatever Erimond did to them looked pretty irreversible, but still."

Across the tower, Erimond struggled to his feet, one arm clutched to his chest as he sent a wall of fire straight at them. Everyone ducked out of the way and by the time the air had cleared, Erimond was gone. Olivia and the others rushed around to the back of the tower, the only place he could have run to, but Erimond wasn't there.

"He's not… Where could he have possibly gone?" shouted Olivia in exasperation.

Varric pointed wordlessly at the remains of a rope bridge swinging against the rock face. Across the chasm, a small figure could be seen climbing onto a horse and riding off.

Olivia sighed. "He had an emergency escape route planned out the entire time. How did he even make that rope bridge?"

Hawke shrugged. "I'm just going to go with 'magic'".

"So, now what?" asked Olivia. "Well, stop the rest of the Wardens from completing this ritual, of course, but we still don't know where they are."

"Er, excuse me." Everyone turned to look at the Warden that Hawke had rescued when he suddenly spoke up. "They're gathering at Adamant Fortress. It's this old, previously abandoned Warden fortress near here."

"You're sure of this?"

He nodded. "Yes, very."

"I guess we're going to Adamant Fortress then. Well, the Inquisition is. Somehow, I don't think that this is something we can do alone."

"Hey, what about this guy?" Varric pointed at the surviving Warden mage with his crossbow. "Kill him?"

Stroud frowned. "He was doing what he thought was the right thing."

"For the record, I generally prefer to force people to try to clean up their own messes over killing them," said Hawke.

Olivia could feel a headache coming on. "Right. Stroud, he's your problem. You can figure out what to do with him when we get back to Skyhold."

This time, they all went together back to Skyhold, sending a message ahead of them from the Western Approach camp. By the time they had arrived, Olivia was extremely relieved to have gotten there, as they had spent the entire trip listening to Hawke and Stroud bickering about the Wardens and their ill-advised plan, with Stroud maintaining that the Wardens' response was completely understandable and Hawke arguing that even if it was understandable, it was also incredibly stupid and the Wardens really shouldn't have the mindset that made them think that such an action was acceptable in light of the ends.

When they were finally coming up the mountain path only a few miles from Skyhold, Stroud brought Anders into the argument, causing Hawke to snap back that there were some very large differences in the two situations, particularly the demons, and was he seriously suggesting that the oppressed party was to blame for the violence because they finally got the guts to fight for their lives and freedoms?

At that point, Olivia attempted to break up the argument, which seemed to be getting a little too personal, by pointing out that the two of them were friends and could they at least agree to disagree on the subject and stop fighting about it? Her interjection stopped Hawke and Stroud for about two hours, after which they began arguing again. Olivia hadn't been so happy to see Skyhold since the very first time she had set eyes on it.

"This might be difficult," said Leliana, looking at the small dot marking the location of Adamant on the war room map. "Adamant Fortress has stood since the time of the second Blight."

"Luckily, that also means that it was built before the invention of modern siege equipment," added Cullen. "A good trebuchet would do a lot of damage. And thanks to the Lady Ambassador," he nodded at Josephine, "We have some of them."

"That would be the good news," said Leliana.

"What's the bad news, then?" asked Olivia, with a sense of foreboding.

"Erimond got away from you in the Western Approach. Other than your interference, his test of the ritual he plans to use went well."

"Meaning that he could have already started raising the demon army," finished Olivia.

Cullen nodded. "We can get into the fortress, but if they already have the demons, things could get nasty."

"Luckily," added Leliana, "I've looked at the layout of the fortress, and there are a lot of choke points where it would be possible to keep the enemy tied up. They were meant to let defenders keep the invaders tied up, but it works the other way around, too."

"We just need to keep them busy while you cut a path through to Warden-Commander Clarel," said Cullen. "With her gone, it should be possible to convince the others to surrender."

"Unless they're under mind control already," said Olivia darkly.

"Some of the warriors might be willing to surrender, though," said Josephine. "They wouldn't be under mind control like the mages are and could listen to reason, especially from a former Warden like you, Inquisitor."

Olivia certainly hoped so. This was going to be painful enough as it was. "Do we have everything we need?"

Cullen nodded. "Yes. We can leave as soon as you give the word."

"Then we leave in the morning."


	9. Chapter 9

In Which There is a Battle

As they fought their way through Adamant Fortress, the situation had quickly devolved into chaos. There were Wardens fighting Inquisition forces, Wardens and demons fighting Inquisition forces, demons, and Wardens and demons fighting each other. A couple dozen or so Wardens that Olivia's group had rescued from demons stopped fighting and retreated when she yelled at them that the Inquisition was trying to wipe out the demons, not all the Wardens and to just get out of the way before they got killed, but it didn't do much to lessen the chaos. The battle had essentially become a three-way brawl with everyone fighting everyone else and, just to make matters worse, it was raining.

Warden-Commander Clarel was, of course, found with Erimond and a man in Warden armor on the parapet overlooking the center courtyard, giving a speech to a large group of Wardens standing around a Fade Rift below her. Olivia and the others arrived just in time to see her say something to the Magister, then turn and cut the throat of the other Warden.

Olivia and the others halted at the edge of the courtyard. "Stop them! They mustn't stop us from completing the ritual!" The Wardens down in the courtyard turned to look at Olivia and her companions, but seemed a bit hesitant to attack. Olivia hoped that it meant they were having second thoughts about going through with a disturbing blood ritual they got from a sketchy Tevinter that involved killing their own comrades.

"Don't listen to him!" she shouted over the rain and distant sounds of fighting. "You're doing exactly what he wants!"

"What, fighting the Blight?" asked Erimond, folding his arms. "Yes, the ritual might involve blood sacrifice, but Wardens have always sacrificed their lives to combat the darkspawn."

Clarel nodded in agreement. "We have always made the sacrifices that no one else will. You know that. Or at least you did once, former Warden-Commander Amell," she added pointedly.

"You're right on one count," said Olivia. "The Wardens have always made the sacrifices that no one else will. But this ritual of his," here she gestured at Erimond, "will allow him to bind all the mages who complete it to Corypheus. That isn't combating the Blight, that's aiding it!"

"Corypheus?" Clarel looked confused. "Didn't he die?"

"No, he didn't," yelled Hawke from behind Olivia. "We only thought he did!"

Erimond snorted derisively. "These people will say anything to stop you."

Clarel brought up a hand to rub her forehead as if she had a headache. "Bring the demon through," she ordered.

The Wardens in the courtyard still looked a bit reluctant to obey. "Please!" shouted Hawke, walking forward. "This isn't going to help anything! I've seen enough blood magic to know that it only ever makes things worse!"

Stroud nodded in agreement with her. "I personally warned at least half of you here against this. Don't make me have to kill you to stop you!"

"Don't do this!" Olivia cried desperately. "You're really going to listen to some suspicious character from the Imperium over people you know?"

The Wardens looked around at each other. "But you've got that creepy mark thing on your hand," said one of the ones standing closer to Olivia and her group. "It could be affecting your brain or something."

"It's on my hand, not my head!" pointed out Olivia. "Besides, Stroud doesn't have one and he came to the same conclusion as me that this ritual is a terrible idea."

"You could be wrong, though," said another Warden. "I mean, what makes you so sure this is Corypheus' plan? He is supposed to be dead, after all."

"Erimond there specifically admitted that it is Corypheus' plan when I ran into him in the Western Approach earlier. He. Is. Tricking. You."

As one, the Wardens turned to look at Erimond with suspicion. He turned to Clarel. "Don't stop now. We've come so far!"

"Maybe we should all sit down and talk about these accusations," said the Warden-Commander.

At that point it was obvious to Olivia that Erimond had lost the Wardens, and he knew it. "Or maybe," he said, "I should bring in an ally that I can actually count on!" He walked over to the edge of the parapet, slamming his staff onto the ground and sending up crackling red sparks. "My master thought you might come here, Inquisitor," he shouted, completely abandoning all pretense. "And he sent me this!" Above the fortress, a huge shape swooped down from the sky.

"Oh, lovely," said Olivia sarcastically. "It's the dragon from Haven." The giant reptile landed on one of the fortress' towers, sending shattered pieces of stone raining down from above.

Behind Erimond, Clarel's expression had gone from horrified to angry. With a snarl on her face, she lifted her staff, sending lightning through Erimond's body. He stared up at her from the ground in shock. "Clarel, wait…"

The Warden-Commander ignored him, sending a second bolt of lightning arching through the sky to hit the dragon. "Help the Inquisition!" she shouted down at the other Wardens, dodging a blast of fire from the dragon while, of course, the Fade Rift decided that this would be a good time to act up and spat out a twelve-foot-tall pride demon.

Olivia swore out loud and drew her sword, automatically reacting to the sudden attack of not one, but two, powerful enemies by casting one of the Arcane Warriors' spells to make herself stronger and another slip halfway into the Fade, remembering at the last second that it was actually the first time she had tried the latter spell both since getting the mark on her hand and near to one of the Fade Rifts. Her heart jumped a beat as her body instantly became completely intangible and the entire world took on a green glow. Feeling shaken, she dropped the spell and dodged a blast of fire coming from the dragon.

Solas was staring. "Inquisitor, did you just use…" his voice cut off as the pride demon roared and charged forward and he had to pull back with Varric and Hawke to attack from a safe distance with long-range weapons, while the others jumped in with their swords.

After a few minutes of sheer chaos, the demon was dead and Olivia and the others found themselves chasing Clarel up the stairs to the battlements, dodging fireballs being rained down on them by the dragon. At nearly the highest point of the fortress, Olivia rounded the corner to the sight of Erimond standing cornered against the edge of the battlement while Clarel walked toward him, angrily slinging magical attacks from her staff.

Olivia and the others began to make their way across the roof, just in time to watch Clarel send Erimond flying across the battlement with a blast of her staff and say something angry before the dragon swooped down and picked Clarel up in its jaws, taking to the air and landing on the roof over where they had just come from. Olivia's group began backing across the battlement, toward where Clarel had previously had Erimond cornered as the dragon shook its head and dropped Clarel in the middle of the battlement, between itself and Olivia's group, before slowly advancing toward them on its claws.

They were the ones now cornered, with the dragon on one side and a sheer, hundred-foot drop on the other. Clarel lay on the ground under the dragon's head, badly injured. "In war, victory, in peace vigilance…" Olivia got the feeling that Clarel was about to do something drastic. After all, the end of that creed was… "in death, sacrifice." Clarel sent a blast of magic up at the dragon just as it began to charge toward Olivia and the others. The dragon fell, shrieking, and the battlement crumbled, sending Olivia, Hawke, Stroud, Varric, Cassandra, and Solas all plunging down into the abyss.

Olivia stared down as she fell head first, filled with mind-numbing terror, the air rushing past too quickly to scream. She reached out her arms as if she could catch herself, unthinking, and her hand flared with green light that filled the air below them as they all fell into the brightness.


	10. Chapter 10

In Which the Fade Facilitates Various Revelations

As she fell through the glow coming from the mark, Olivia's surroundings changed from Adamant fortress to a rocky landscape filled with boulders of varying sizes floating in a greenish sky. The Fade. She abruptly stopped falling, suspended in the air above what looked like the ground before floating slowly down to hang just above it, staring directly at the rocky surface just below? above? her head. Cautiously, Olivia reached up? Down? and poked at the rock with a finger. Instantly, whatever was keeping her floating stopped and she found herself crashing painfully down on the rocks.

Feeling disoriented, she staggered to her feet, groaning. "Where are we?" she turned behind herself to look at the speaker. Stroud was standing on one of the boulders, perpendicular to Olivia's own position in an odd, confusing fashion.

"We were falling," said Hawke vaguely, standing- nearly upside down, from Olivia's perspective- on a slightly larger floating rock. "Are we dead. Because if we are the afterlife is not nearly as fun as Isabella always said she thought it would be."

Olivia let out a short laugh. "No. My mark was acting up when we were falling and we fell through the rift it created. I'm pretty sure this is the Fade."

Hawke looked around. "It's not nearly as hazy as I always remember it being. Everything seems so- solid and defined. Not like normal."

"Well, we aren't dreaming; we're actually here. I guess the Fade looks different when you've got a body while visiting."

"Huh." Hawke turned to look at Olivia. "According to rumor you walked out of the Fade after the explosion at the Conclave. Do you remember it being like this?"

"I don't remember it being like anything," admitted Olivia. "I still don't have any memories of what happened there."

"I think our biggest problem right now would be finding out how to get back out of the Fade."

"How though?"

"Back in our world the rift that the demons were coming through wasn't that far away," pointed out Stroud. "In the main hall. Could we escape through there?"

Olivia looked up at the glowing green scar looming nearby in what amounted to the Fade's sky. "If the demons could get through then I don't see why we wouldn't be able to do the same. Let's go." She began heading toward the rift, the others following behind her.

Being in the Fade was much different in physical form than it was in dreams. Everything around her felt more real. The sky was darker and the rocks more solid. The muddy water splashing around her feet left her boots wet.

They moved across the cliff surrounded low area that they had arrived in and began walking up a set of stairs carved into the rocks. At the top, they turned a corner to find a woman in chantry robes standing in their path. Olivia stopped walking, looking at her in surprise. A demon she would have expected, but this looked far too human to be a spirit. "By the Maker!" exclaimed Stroud. "Divine Justinia?" It certainly looked like her. The old woman smiled, greeting Olivia and Hawke by their titles.

Olivia looked at her suspiciously. "Aren't you dead?"

"She is," said Stroud. "This must be a spirit of some sort. Maybe even a demon."

The thing that looked like Divine Justinia smiled again. "Is my survival really that impossible? After all, you're here alive in the Fade yourselves. But we don't have time to spend arguing over who are what I am."

"You have to realize why we're worried, though," said Hawke. "It wouldn't hurt to tell us what you are, would it?"

"I am here to help you," said the woman. She turned to Olivia. "You do not remember what happened at the Conclave."

"And I suppose you know why?" asked Olivia skeptically.

"Your memories of what happened there were taken from you by a demon that serves Corypheus. A nightmare that feeds off of memories of fear and darkness. The false calling that frightened the Wardens into making such terrible mistakes was its doing and this part of the Fade is its lair."

"Wonderful," Olivia muttered. "How does Corypheus have so many demons working for him anyway?" she asked rhetorically.

"I don't know," admitted the thing that may or may not be Divine Justinia. "Perhaps his power comes from the Blight. The fear demon, at least, chooses to serve him. As one of the Magisters who unleased the first Blight, Corypheus has created much fear for it to feed off of."

"Great. The real question though, is how we get out of here. If you're really here to help I'd appreciate help with that."

"That is why I'm here. While you were in the Fade at Haven, the demon took some of your memories before you leave you must get them back."

"Do you mean that as in we can't leave until then or that we shouldn't?"

"Does it matter? They're your memories. I would think that you'd like them back."

That was true. "So where are they then?" Olivia asked.

"Before you, on the path to the rift." The woman gestured at a glowing green light a few yards away from them. "Like that."

Without thinking, Olivia moved toward the light.

She crossed the space between the staircase and the outcropping where the memory was resting and reached out her hand into the center of it. A jolt of energy ran up her arm and a flash of memory burst into her mind, the image of Justinia's face and her voice telling Olivia to run and warn everyone. Gasping, Olivia staggered backward.

"Are you all right?" Olivia looked up at the sound of Hawkes voice. She and the others looked worried.

"I'm fine." Olivia said shortly. "We need to keep moving." She looked around and hurried up to the next glowing memory, sticking her hand into the center of it much more boldly. A flash of Corypheus' face and his voice ordering someone to bring a sacrifice forward. With a sense of urgency Olivia hurried over to the next memory to hear her own voice bursting in angrily asking what was happening. She needed to know what had happened. She ran to the final memory and grabbed at it.

The full memory filled her head. Walking into the Temple of Sacred Ashes to find several Grey Warden mages held Divine Justinia floating in the air in a swirl of magic, Corypheus standing in front of her and holding out a glowing green orb, a burst of magic flowing out of it and lighting up Justinia's body. "What's going on here?" Olivia heard her own voice asking angrily. Corypheus' face turned to her and the Divine swung her hand forward, knocking the orb out of Corypheus' hand, where it went flying and bounced across the floor to land in front of Olivia. She picked it up and the memory ended in agonizing pain.

Olivia staggered backward, gasping and clutching her head.

"So your mark came from the orb, not Andraste," said Stroud. Olivia belatedly realized that all the others must have been seeing the memories too.

"Corypheus planned to use the Anchor to open the Veil, enter the Fade, and throw open the gates of the Black City. For his own sake, this time, rather than for the Old Gods." Explained the Justinia apparition. "When you interrupted the ritual, the orb gave the Anchor to you instead of him."

"Well," said Olivia, laughing weakly. "It's not like I really expected Andraste to just show up and give me a crazy power herself."

"You still feel disappointed, though."

Olivia gave a strained smile. "We should work on getting out of here."

The spirit nodded. "The demon knows you are here now. You must hurry. I will go prepare the way ahead of you." She vanished into thin air.

Olivia blinked and turned around to face the others. Hawke had a worried, slightly angry expression on her face. "Something wrong, Hawke?" asked Stroud.

"Those were Grey Wardens helping Corypheus. They caused her death."

"I assumed that Corypheus had them under mind control, like we already knew he's done before."

"Still…"

"We can talk about this later," said Stroud. "After we're out of the Fade."

"Oh, I certainly intend to," muttered Hawke darkly.


	11. Chapter 11

In Which Fear Demons Are Actually and Aid to Communication

As they continued through the wet, dark winding pathways of the fear demon's territory, a swarm of minor fear demons attacked them. The ugly, spiderlike demons were relatively easy to dispatch, possibly, Olivia considered, because they weren't embodying any specific fears of anyone in the party.

"Inquisitor, I was wondering," commented Varric, looking at one of the dead fear demons.

"About what?" asked Olivia.

"All the other Wardens were hearing the Calling, even before you got the Mark and apparently became un-Tainted or whatever. So why didn't you?"

"Why didn't Alistair?" asked Olivia rhetorically. "Maybe the fear demon was only targeting active Wardens. Or maybe it didn't affect me because I've never really been afraid of the Calling. I've faced worse than dying in the Deep Roads surrounded by the corpses of darkspawn I'd killed. It's a major step up from being made Tranquil, for example."

A deep, ominous laugh echoed through the air, not seeming to come from any particular source. "Maybe I'm the one that should be afraid. Facing such a pack of brave heroes as you."

"I'm guessing that would be the fear demon," commented Olivia.

The demon cackled again. "Your inquisitor is a fake, Cassandra. She was helped by a spirit, not Andraste. Her powers did not come from the Maker. Just more evidence that he doesn't exist. All of your faith is for nothing."

"Go die in the Void, demon," Cassandra snapped angrily.

The demon once more laughed darkly- it seemed to do that a lot- and said something in ancient Elven to Solas that had the mage snapping back a sharp denial. Olivia could vaguely understand the gist of it if she didn't think about it too much. "What was that about victory and pride?"

"Nothing!" said Solas quickly.

"Did he just call you 'trickster'?"

"No!" denied the elf.

Olivia decided to drop the subject. "Fine, I guess it's private anyway." She was still going to keep an eye on him.

"You've put Hawke in danger yet again, Varric. You found the red lyrium, you brought her here."

"Actually, I'm pretty sure that this is all Corypheus' fault," pointed out Hawke.

"And who let Corypheus out of his prison?" the demon asked gleefully. "Did you really think that anything you did ever mattered? You couldn't save your own city, how could you possibly expect to be able to kill a god? Your family is going to die. Anders, your siblings, your child… all dead. Just like your mother, and all the people you failed to save."

"Oh, you are going to be really fun to kill," commented Hawke.

"And you, Warden Stroud. How does it feel to know that you are responsible for the fall of the Wardens, the organization you had dedicated your whole life to? Who will be to blame for the destruction when the next Blight comes?"

"Again, still Corypheus," said Olivia.

"Oh, Inquisitor. So bold. Did you really think you could just keep on succeeding? You define yourself by the lives you have saved and think that they make all your suffering worthwhile. What will you be when the next terrible enemy has claimed them? You've come so far only to inevitably stumble at the finish line. All your accomplishments, everything you have gained will be lost. It will all have been for nothing. Learning to hope was the greatest mistake you ever made. And you'll know that when your futile attempts to stand between the innocent and the darkness that would destroy them finally fail."

Olivia smiled viciously. "Really have me pegged, don't you? Except you're the one that's going to fail. A few words aren't going to scare me. I'm going to make you eat them!" She gripped her sword tighter and moved forward with greater determination than before.

"Is that really how you form your sense of identity?" asked Solas quietly. "By the lives you've saved?"

"Is that actually surprising?" Olivia cut one of the minor fear demons in half with her sword. "I started out defining myself as an Amell, but then my family was killed and I got dragged off and imprisoned. So then I was a Circle mage. But then I the whole Jowan thing-long story- happened and I became a Grey Warden. And I liked that. But then the Conclave happened, I lost my Warden powers and the Taint, gained a glowing green mark on my hand and somehow ended up becoming the leader of a religious movement. So yes, I define myself by what I've done. My actions are more of a constant than my abilities or what social group I belong to."

"So… what would you do if something did destroy the world even after everything you'd done to protect it?" he asked.

"Oh, I'd go on a rampage and brutally murder whatever was responsible for the end of the world. Even if it had killed me. I would come back and destroy it. Whatever it was should better spend the rest of its existence looking over its shoulder for me, because I would find a way to crawl back out of the afterlife and inflict upon it such agony that it would beg for death." The speech started out in a cheerful tone but quickly devolved into a dark, vicious snarl. Everyone else in the party looked shaken, particularly Solas who seemed to be greatly regretting his decision to bring up the subject. "You don't need worry though," Olivia added reassuringly, smiling brightly at the elf. "After all, you're on my side." Solas did not seem comforted.

"I think you might have scared him more than the fear demon did," commented Hawke, looking at Solas' pale face.

"Any other profound yet terrifying conversations we want to have about things the fear demon brought up?" asked Varric. "Just to get things off our chests. I mean, no better timing then while we're trapped in the Fade and surrounded by constantly attacking monsters."

"Actually, yes," said Cassandra.

"I was being sarcastic," complained the dwarf.

Cassandra ignored him, instead looking at Hawke with a small confused frown. "So…" she said awkwardly, "from what the demon said earlier…You're still in a relationship with Anders?" It came out as a question.

"Yes."

"Why?" Cassandra sounded disbelieving.

Hawke sighed. "Because I never actually disagreed with him. I was angry that he lied to me, and that he didn't plan far enough ahead. His plan was 'start a war, then immediately get killed for it' and he didn't think about things like 'how do I make sure the innocent bystanders that are going to immediately become targets out of danger?' I wasn't upset that he started a revolution, I was upset that he didn't plan it out well enough."

"You don't think that what he did was wrong?" asked Cassandra incredulously. "Even by blowing up a Chantry?"

"If there had been civilians inside at the time I would have, but the only people still in there were clerics who had knowingly sworn to serve a regime that oppressed, crippled, and killed innocent people, without even voicing a single complaint about what they were doing."

"He also started a chaotic, continent-spanning war!"

Hawke sighed. "I spent my entire life believing that I'd always have to live in fear. Then this happened and there was suddenly a chance for that to change. For the first time, I had hope for a better future. You might take freedom for granted but it has a price, Cassandra. One that has to be paid for in blood."

Cassandra sputtered. "But…" she looked helplessly at Olivia. "Inquisitor…"

"If you want me to say that I disagree, you're going to find yourself disappointed. Rebellions always happen for a reason, and I'm a bit too close to the situation to look at it objectively. I've had some pretty bad things happen to me because of being a mage, the same as everyone else."

Why are we having all these conversations now?" complained Varric.

"I think it's a because of a combination of the fact that the fear demon brought the issues to our attention and the fact that everyone feels more comfortable sharing their thoughts while we're in the Fade than in our dimension because everything seems less real here," Olivia admitted.

"So it's time for an impromptu therapy hour. Good to know."

They rounded a corner and defeated a few more demons to find the spirit that looked like Divine Justinia standing in the center of the path. As they approached the spirit turned and began floating on ahead of them. "You must get through the rift and close it behind you, Inquisitor." Reminded the spirit.

"Therapy hour is over," said Olivia. "I get the feeling we're about to reach the fear demon." They turned yet another corner to see the rift glowing green in an open area just ahead of them. "We're almost there," said Hawke, smiling.

Varric groaned. "Why did you say that? Now something is bound to go wrong." Hawke looked horrified at the realization of what she had just done.

As they got closer they saw what else was in front of them, namely a giant spider-shaped creature with a smaller, more vaguely humanoid body attached to it, directly between them and the rift. "You just had to say it, didn't you? I'm guessing that's the fear demon."

Everyone gripped their weapons and prepared to attack the demon, but before they could the spirit that may or may not have been Divine Justinia floated forward, heading directly for the fear demon. "When you escape, please tell Leliana- "I'm sorry, I failed you too." The spirit asked in its echoing voice as it began to glow more brightly. The spirit exploded in a burst of light that knocked the main body of the fear demon backward out of their way and left only the humanoid part standing between them and the portal. Instantly, all six of them attacked it.

Killing just that part of the fear demon was difficult. Not as difficult as it would have been to kill the entire thing, but the demon used its smaller size to maneuver around them and make itself more difficult to hit. After a few minutes-which felt much longer than they actually were- they managed to corner the demon and kill it. They ran toward the portal, which glowed just up ahead of them, the main body of the fear demon standing ominously over it and dripping blood from where the Justinia spirit had attacked it. At the sight of what was hovering over the way out, everyone drew up short, the realization that it was still in the way bringing them to a sudden halt.

"We need to clear a path!" shouted Stroud, stating what they were all thinking.

"You go ahead," said Hawke, "I'll cover you."

"No!" said Stroud. "You were right earlier, this situation is at least half the Wardens' fault. I'll do it."

"Stroud," Hawke began.

The Warden shook his head. "Go. I've known that I was eventually going to end up dying fighting a monster in the middle of its home territory ever since I joined the Wardens and you have a lot more to live for than I do, now. Even ignoring all the friends and family you've got who'll miss you, are you really going to heroically sacrifice yourself and leave the situation with Corypheus unfinished? You were just complaining that you were angry at Anders for trying to do exactly that." There wasn't really any good argument against that, and Hawke obviously knew it.

Before anyone could come up with one, Stroud nodded at Olivia and raised his sword, charging forward with a cry of "For the Wardens!" While the demon was distracted by him slicing at it with his blade, the rest of the group made a dash for the rift and dove through.


	12. Chapter 12

The five of them toppled out of the rift, landing in the center of a group of Wardens in the middle of a pitched battle with several demons. Olivia immediately whirled around and reached up her hand to the rift to close it. As soon as she had done so, the rift exploded with energy and the demons that the Wardens had been fighting all dropped dead. After a moment, Olivia and the others breathed a sigh of relief.

While they were coming down from battle mode, Hawke hurried over to the Wardens and began walking among them, talking to the relieved warriors and confused looking mages. After a couple minutes, in which the fact that the fight was over, sunk into everyone Hawke walked back over to Olivia and the rest of their group. "It's like what …Justinia?... the spirit suggested," Hakwe said. "Now that the Fear demon is no longer in the way, its power over them is finished. The mages are no longer under mind control and nobody is hearing the Calling anymore." She smiled wryly. "They're already saying that the Inquisitor broke the spell with the Maker's blessing."

Olivia gave a small, exhausted laugh. "Of course they are. I bet it's going to be impossible to dissuade them of the notion, too." Her shoulders slumped. "Considering that we're alive and victorious, I can't even bring myself to care what they think about how it happened. Maker, I hate the Fade."

"I guess you're right," assented Hawke.

She began to say something else, but before she could speak, one of the Inquisition's scouts came running up. "Inquisitor! The Archdemon flew away as soon as you vanished earlier." Olivia took a moment to wonder inwardly how they jumped from 'dragon' to 'Archdemon', considering that she was fairly certain it wasn't one, and almost missed the rest of the scout's report, which consisted of him going on to explain that they had captured the Magister. "…and as for the Wardens, the ones who weren't corrupted helped us fight the demons," he finished. The scout sounded distinctly irritated at the mention of the Wardens who had been 'corrupted'. Olivia couldn't help but tiredly note that the attitude was probably going to be a problem in the future.

As the scout finished talking, a fully armored Warden ran up and stood next to him, quickly following the scout's report with an assurance that the Wardens were standing by to help make up for 'Clarel's mistake'. "Wait, where is Stroud?" The Warden asked, suddenly noticing that the man was missing from Olivia's party. Hawke looked down at her feet, gritting her teeth.

"Warden Stroud is dead," said Olivia shortly. "None of us would be standing here alive without him. His sacrifice allowed us to win. He was an example of the Grey Wardens' ideals, even while Corypheus tried to destroy u…you from within. Do not forget that." She very carefully did not look at the scout who had rather obviously begun feeling resentful of the Wardens.

It was impossible to tell what the Warden's face looked like under his helmet, but his voice sounded slightly panicked. "Inquisitor, all of our high-ranking officers are dead. What do we do now?" His voice was shaking.

"You stay here and do what you can to fight. Stroud died for the Wardens' ideals. In war, victory. And we are still at war. Do you believe you can still help?"

"I do, Inquisitor." The Warden's voice sounded stronger now.

"Good. You are still vulnerable to Corypheus' mind control, and possibly to the Venatori as well, but there are still plenty of demons around that you can fight."

"Thank you, Inquisitor," said the Warden. "We will not fail you." He turned around and walked away, presumably to go talk to the other Wardens.

While he was talking, Hawke's eyes widened slightly. "I need to go to warn the Wardens at Weisshaupt. If they don't know what happened here then they could be caught off guard by Corypheus' mind control as well."

Olivia almost swore at the thought of this entire mess happening all over again. "Good idea."

Hawke's mouth moved into something closer to her usual cheery smile. "Good luck, Olivia. Monsters and demons notwithstanding, it was good to work with you. And take care of Varric for me."

"I think it's more likely that I'll be taking care of her," commented the dwarf.

Hawke smirked and waved back at them over her shoulder as she walked away. "Until later, you two. And the same to the rest of you as well. This isn't the last you'll see of me."

Upon their return to Skyhold, Olivia met with Leliana to discuss their next move, namely thwarting the second part of Corypheus' plan to throw Orlais into chaos- assassinating Empress Celene. "I've already made all the arrangements for you to attend the ball in Halamshiral, when the assassins plan to strike. We still have some time before the ball, so Cullen, Josephine, and I will spend it figuring out the best way for you to get an audience with the Empress."

Olivia nodded in acknowledgement. "Good. I'm sure that there are going to be quite a few minor crises to take care of in the meantime. It just never ends, does it?"

Leliana gave a small smile. "No, it doesn't." The two of them stood in silence for a moment. "What was she like?" asked Leliana abruptly. "Divine Justinia, or her ghost, or the spirit that chose to appear as her. I read the report that you sent ahead and I know it wasn't entirely clear what she was, but..."

"She seemed peaceful, calm, serene. She showed us the way the entire time."

"That seems like something she would do."

"And…" Olivia broke off for a moment, not entirely sure how to continue.

"What?"

"She had a message for you. 'Tell Leliana- I'm sorry, I failed you too.'"

"Oh," said Leliana quietly. After a moment she straightened up. "I should go finish what I was working on before I forget about it. Maybe we could talk about this later?"

"Of course."

For once, it was a quiet, non-catastrophic day that Olivia spent working on various mundane tasks required to run a swiftly growing military/religious organization. Checking on supplies, managing personnel, making sure none of the people in Skyhold were trying to kill each other… And thinking.

In the late evening, after supper and while things were temporarily quiet, Olivia got another chance to talk to Leliana.

"So," said Olivia, sitting down next to the other woman on a bench in the garden. "You ready to talk about what happened in the Fade?"

Leliana sighed. "This entire time, I was thinking that I had failed her. I was the spymaster, I was in charge of noticing plots to attack her… I wasn't there to save her. What could she have meant saying that she failed me too?"

"Because what happened wasn't your fault," said Olivia. "But she put all that responsibility on you and that made you feel like it was your fault for not stopping it, even though there was nothing you could have done. I think… maybe she blamed herself for your undeserved guilt. You feel guilty for failing and she feels guilty for causing you that pain. I think… maybe it's time to let your guilt go. It isn't doing either of you any favors."

"I suppose you're right," admitted Leliana. "That doesn't make it any easier." She sighed. "You're worried about something, too, aren't you? You've been unusually preoccupied ever since getting back from Adamant Fortress."

"I'm worried about all sorts of things. Corypheus, demons, the assassination plot, the Wardens, the mages going back to being oppressed when this all settles down, Corypheus, Venatori, being the leader of the Inquisiton, Corypheus…"

"You said Corypheus three times."

"I'm especially worried about him, he's responsible for causing most of the other problems that I'm worried about."

"True. But in all seriousness, there's something else that's bothering you, more than the usual background worries about all those other things you just listed. What is it?"

Olivia sighed and tilted her head back to look at the sky. "It's this mark on my hand. I have no idea what it's doing to me. Not just that for all I know it could be slowly killing me, but it's changing me. The first thing we noticed about it was that it somehow got the Taint out of my blood. It was caused by a mysterious ancient Elven artifact that we know nothing about and there's no way of knowing what else it does."

"So what happened during the fight at Adamant Fortress that brought this to the forefront of your mind?"

"Beyond the fact that it created a portal to the Fade that we fell through and ended up there in our physical bodies?" Olivia asked wryly. "It's affecting my magic. Some of the spells that I cast, I mean. During the battle I tried to use one of my Arcane Warrior spells. The one that lets me go halfway into the Fade, remember? The mark did something strange to it. My body went completely intangible instantly, and I could see my surroundings in both the real world and the Fade at the same time. Normally when I use that spell I go partially intangible at times, yes, but I can still only see the real world. Or rather I could. It was like I was both in the Fade and the real world simultaneously. I actually tried it again later, once the battle was over, and I could touch things in both the real world and the Fade, too. It's not an imminent disaster for the Inquisiton, but it's still pretty alarming to me."

"This is all mage stuff, I don't think there's anything I can do about it," admitted Leliana.

"Yeah, I know," said Olivia. "I didn't think you would be. But, it was seriously jarring, to say the least and you did ask. Besides, who else would I be telling about it? As much as I love some of the people here, there really isn't anyone else that I'd be comfortable talking about this with. Okay, maybe Varric," she allowed, "but the others, not so much."

"Even if it's uncomfortable, you should still probably talk to Solas," said Leliana. "He's a bit of an enigma, but he does happen to be the resident Fade expert."

"Ugh." Olivia stood up. "I suppose you're right. It just feels a little private. I guess that's because I's got me rattled. I'll go find him now, before I start coming up with excuses not to talk about it. Thanks, Leliana." She walked over to the door to the inside of the castle.

In the rotunda off to the side of the great hall, Solas was sitting at his desk drinking a cup of tea. As Olivia watched, he took a sip and immediately pursed his lips with displeasure, glaring at the tea in his cup as if it had personally offended him. Distracted from her original purpose, Olivia raised an eyebrow. "What did that tea do to you to make you look so irritated with it?"

"I hate tea," said Solas.

"So why are you drinking it, then?" asked Olivia reasonably.

"I'm in a bad mood," said the mage. "Unpleasant dreams last night. Actually, I think I need to ask a favor of you."

That was unexpected. "Of course, what is it?"

"One of my oldest friends has been captured by some mages and forced into slavery. I heard them calling for help last night while I was asleep."

Olivia narrowed her eyebrows. "I'm guessing that this friend of yours is a spirit," she commented.

"Yes, a spirit of wisdom. They were living peacefully in the Fade when the mages summoned them. Does the fact that they're a spirit mean you won't help?"

"Oh, I will," said Olivia. "They're your friend, and you're mine. Besides, I don't like the idea of leaving anyone in slavery, spirit or not."

"Thank you," said Solas sincerely. "I sensed about the area where my friend was before I woke up. It's in the Exalted Plains."

Olivia nodded. "Right. It's too late to go anywhere tonight, but we can leave in the morning. Before any new crises come up."

It was only after returning to her room that Olivia realized that she had become completely sidetracked and forgotten entirely about what she had originally been planning to talk to him about.


End file.
